


When The Sun Rises

by EmilsGhost (etherealspectre)



Category: Fallout: New Vegas
Genre: Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Convenient Plot Devices, Dead Money DLC, Deception, Depression, Gay, Hurt/Comfort, I hope, Lonesome Road DLC, M/M, Masturbation, Maybe - Freeform, Mild Gore, Minor canon divergence, Murder, Nightmares, Old World Blues DLC, Oral Sex, PTSD, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Repetitive thoughts, Romance, Self-Harm, Sexual Tension, Slow Burn, Suicide, There will be fluff, War, eventually, its a gay collectathon y'all, lying
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-10
Updated: 2018-09-24
Packaged: 2019-06-25 14:42:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 15
Words: 53,567
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15642867
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/etherealspectre/pseuds/EmilsGhost
Summary: The cloud shifted, a stiff wind blowing it through the corridors of the villa. Aberdeen backed towards the wall - the only way he could go without fully suffocating. The collar beeped as he reached it, and he knew that somewhere, up high, a radio, out of sight, out of reach, was sealing his fate. He took a look through the cloud, staring at the menacing figures of the ghost people staggering within. He took a deep breath, pushed off the wall, diving into the cloud and sprinting towards freedom, or certain death.





	1. Corrosion

Courier Six, better known as Aberdeen to those few he considered to be friends, had the inability to cry. The feeling would swell up inside him - the depression. The mania. The horrors of the Mojave and all he had seen.

But then, the tears would never come.

When kidnapped to the Big Empty, Aberdeen desperately tried to explain this to the Auto-Doc. “Maybe you can fix me,” he pleaded. “You can replace my brain, my heart, my spine. I became a living Yellow Brick Road for you,” he said. “Fix me.”

“Sorry,” the Auto-Doc sighed. “Can’t fix what was never there to begin with.”

Aberdeen, in his frustration, kicked Muggy across the room. The Courier apologized to the poor robot, who swore that it would never clean another mug for him if it were the last thing it did. Muggy, of course, is a dirty liar, and Aberdeen brought every dish he could get his hands on back to the Big Empty, once a month. Muggy would eventually forget this, and the Auto-Doc would think in its processors about that day for the rest of its seemingly eternal lifespan.

* * *

 

It was a frightfully eventful day in the Mojave. A rare rain, albeit acid-laced, fell from the sky in sheets, so hard that some feared it would fill the dry basins of Ivanpah and El Dorado. Finally, the people across the Mojave sighed, finally. A rain for our sorrows. A rain for our crops. A rain to flood out the monsters that lurk in the wastes. Finally.

The Courier paced listlessly back and forth in front of the entrance to Freeside. Just inside, he knew, there was the Old Mormon Fort. Just inside, he knew, was a number of doctors he could talk to. Just inside, he knew, Aberdeen could seek therapy at the hands of the Followers. But why the hesitation? Why was it even so important? He tuned the radio on his Pip-Boy and strained to listen to it over the thunderous rain. No use, thought the Courier. Can barely hear my own thoughts.

He leaned his head against the chain-link covering the entrance to Freeside. Aberdeen counted himself lucky to be wearing mostly waterproofed riot gear and helmet, though he could feel the skin on his fingers where the gloves had ripped away turning raisin-like and dreaded the trench foot he may get should the hole in his boot wear any larger. Standing in a puddle would not help. Moving would not help. Why the fuck is he still standing here?! What is so god damn important about his stupid fucking emotions that he seeks them to be repaired more than revenge or answers from the man who shot him?!

Aberdeen took a deep breath.

Without emotions, what are we?

With that thought in mind, Courier Six pushed open the entrance gate to Freeside and sought out the doctors awaiting him in the Fort.

* * *

 

Somewhere across the Mojave, a single radio sat on a table in the middle of an empty room. A light hung over it. It sang into the darkness, into the day of endless rains: 

_“Has your life taken a turn? Do troubles beset you? Has fortune left you behind? If so, the Sierra Madre Casino, in all its glory, is inviting you to begin again. Come to a place where wealth, excitement and intrigue await around every corner. Stroll along the winding streets of our beautiful resort, make new friends, or rekindle old flames. Let your eyes take in the luxurious expanse of the open desert under clear star-lit skies. Gaze straight on into the sunset from our villa rooftops. Countless diversions await: Gamble in our casino, take in the theater, or stay in one of our exclusive executive suites that will shelter you and cater to your every whim. So if life’s worries have weighed you down, if you need an escape from your troubles, or if you just need an opportunity to begin again, join us, let go, and leave the world behind at the Sierra Madre grand opening this October… We’ll be waiting.“_


	2. Stripped Away

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You can scream all you'd like, but the rain will drown you out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i have literally no consistency when it comes to chapter lengths  
> also see: liberal use of dialogue and not sticking to the script at all

The Courier stared up into the morning sky, Mojave dust tugging at the hems of his jacket, cracked, dry asphalt beneath his boots. Something about being back in the Mojave - back  _home_  - brought a great sigh of relief to him, a sigh that shuddered deep throughout his body. Long had he walked, long had he been exposed to the dangers that lay outside the wastes he had grown to know, and finally, he was home.

Home, he thought, blinking upwards at that same morning sky, sun hidden behind endless layers of charcoal clouds that hailed down the storm, is where he would like to be most. Laying down on his bed in Novac, shaped to the curve of his body, fiddling with a Dinky the Dino plastic figure and wondering how hilarious it would be to turn it into a grenade. Pop the head, toss over a wall, hear a solitary moment of confusion, then,  _boom!_

 _“Ahem,”_  an impatient cough interrupted his thoughts. Aberdeen turned his head to stare at the figure in the tent beside him. The woman inside was waving him in. “Come on, get out of the rain already!”

He obliged and stepped underneath the canvas. Buckets were strewn about, catching drops of water that fell through in areas where the tent had been chewed through by moths.

“Sorry about the mess,” said the woman. She was a frazzled looking person, like the stress had sunk deep into her skin, but she still wore a genuine smile on her face. The hair on her head had looked like it once had a mohawk, but had been flattened by the onslaught of rain and was now slicked back. Her eyes shone bright green, even in the dimness of the tent. She wore, much like many of the Followers, a doctor’s lab coat. “My name is Julie, and I’m the leader of this branch of the Followers of the Apocalypse. Are you in need of any medical attention?”

“One could say that,” croaked out Aberdeen. He removed his helmet to give her a proper look. “Not in the physical sense, though.” Julie seemed taken aback to see his face. Aberdeen was not handsome by one’s standard definitions - his travels have caused scars, more than just on the surface. Across his dark brown skin stretched a bright pink, fresh scar, temporarily blinding his left eye. It ran up into his scalp, stopping just before the scar where he had been shot just three months prior. Fainter than them both, unnoticeable if not by where the hair could not grow, the scar from his lobotomy in the Big Empty. “Pardon my manners. I’m Courier Six.”

“An interesting name,” she commented, looking him over. “Are you  _the_  courier that everyone has been talking about?”

“One and the same.” 

“My goodness. And here I thought all the celebrities had been stolen away to the Strip.”

“I’ve got an invitation from a man named Benny up there,” he grimaced, “but I’ve decided to leave it for some other time.”

“I see. So how can we help you today, Courier?”

“I’m looking for a therapist.”

“Well, you’re quite forward.”

“Takes a lesser man to not admit when he’s down.” Aberdeen was not one to be afraid of opening up to people, or showing his emotions. While some people become tough and an impenetrable wall when facing bad times, he had turned softer and knew that this was his only life. So to speak, having risen from the grave. Speak true, speak kindly, but take shit from no-one. It’s done him well thus far, and goody-two-shoes as it may seem, treating others with kindness makes their lives that much easier and gained him that much more in return. All in all, it was a selfish way of life.

“Well, I’m sorry to say, but I don’t think we have what you’re looking for here. The Followers specialize in some forms of mental health, mainly addiction, but we may not…” She trailed off, seeing the pained look on Aberdeen’s face. Julie thought a moment. “Actually, we might.” Julie turned to point in the direction farther into the Fort. “Head into the tent just past the one next to this. In there, there’s one of our doctors. He’s less of a doctor and more of a researcher, though. He might be able to figure something out to help you with your problems.”

“So… you want him to experiment on me?” Aberdeen arched an eyebrow, a sarcastic smirk on his lips. Julie opened her mouth to retort but caught onto his tone before giving a disapproving grunt, narrowing her eyes. 

“I take it you’re the type to express his pain in the form of humor.”

“Ring-a-ding-ding!” That smirk grew into a shit-eating grin.

“Get out of my tent.” Aberdeen let out a short laugh, threw back on his helmet and trotted to the tent, Julie watching him disappear into the rain.  _They’ll be a good fit,_  she thought, then swore at how much water was pooling at her feet.

 

* * *

 

 

The courier stepped into the tent. This one was much smaller than the one that Julie had hurried him into, and only occupied a single person, sitting at a desk, fiddling with a barrel cacti. The sound of someone stepping in was enough to startle the man, who dropped his succulent and spun around to face the courier. Blonde hair that had been made unusually curly by the weather framed at the top of the man’s face, followed by rectangle glasses that shadowed green eyes - though a duller shade than those of Julie’s. 

“Uh, hi,” Aberdeen waved awkwardly. He once again took off his helmet, this time, sticking it on a nearby, unoccupied chair. “Julie sent me over here? I’m, uh, Courier Six. What are you…”

“Oh,” the man seemed to swallow what may have been a lump in his throat and cleared it out. “You know. Finding treatments to common illnesses and injuries. Simpaks out of barrel cacti, and other fantastic improbabilities.” He nodded his head back to the succulent, eyes rolling so hard they’d’ve been better off on a New Vegas betting table. “As far as fruitless wastes of time go, this one is quite noble in its aims.”

“I see,” Aberdeen nodded. He had quite the knowledge of medicine after having to patch himself up so much and all the magazines and books he’d found, reading them during long, boring nights of nothingness. “She had told me you were a researcher.”

“I’m not much of a people person. So I’ve got no qualms with Julie sticking me back here.”

“Yeah, no shit, I don’t even know your name yet.” 

“My apologies. My name is Arcade Gannon.”

“That doesn’t sound very real,” Aberdeen eyed him with suspicion and amusement.

“The situation we live in currently doesn’t sound very real, yet, here we are!” Arcade threw his hands up in annoyance. “Now, why did Julie send you over here?”

Aberdeen eyed the doctor over a little more carefully. Looking at the shape of his nose, the way his hair made perfect circles, broad shoulders and legs that went for miles. He found himself being hit with the initial feelings of a crush - love at first sight. Being the rational person he is, he swallowed that and planted his butt firmly on some dry ground up against a metal shelving unit.

“Turns out I need a good-looking doctor to help take care of me in the big, bad wastes,” he said with a smirk. Arcade scoffed at this, the slightest hints of a smile tugging at the corners of his lips and a quick flash of red washing over his face.

“Overt flirtation will get you anywhere, you know,” he finally forced out with a chuckle. “Seriously, what would Julie send a courier to me for?”

“She thought your research might have helped you come across something for my mental health issues. Unsurprisingly, I have depression, but have found myself unable to cry in recent memory.” Aberdeen tapped the top of his head on his bullet wound. “Might’ve been able to before this magical eraser, but all I could remember when I woke up was my name and the face of the man who shot me.”

With this, Arcade made a hard face. His mouth twisted at trying to find the right words to say. But the look said enough for Aberdeen.

“I’ll take that as a no, then.”

“I wouldn’t say that-”

But Aberdeen was already standing up, moving to put his helmet on. “Sorry to waste your time, doc,” he muttered in a frustrated tone. How many more days would he have to suffer with this? Strange as it may seem, it had effected his other emotional responses, too. How much longer would he have to think about how he would be unable to properly mourn? Laugh? Did he even truly feel anything? 

Arcade leaned over, grabbing the courier’s wrist. “Don’t,” he said in a stage whisper, barely audible above the rain. “What you really need, I think? Is a friend.” Aberdeen stared at Arcade with marvel. The doctor’s face screwed up and he released his grasp, face reddening with either ire or embarrassment. He leaned back in his chair, eyes fixated on his feet. “I’m sorry. You’re free to go as you wish.”

Aberdeen hovered for a minute, then put his helmet on, and stepped into the rain. Arcade didn’t even watch as he went.

 

* * *

 

 

Exactly two hours later, around 11 a.m., the courier returned to the tent. The rain had persisted relentlessly, forcing Arcade and the other residents of the Old Mormon Fort to the inside barracks. Aberdeen swore and rushed into the nearest tower and set search. When finally he came upon Arcade, he was slowly picking at an early lunch of cold grilled mantis.

“Courier,” he said in shock, “I didn’t think you’d return.”

Silently, only panting, Aberdeen sat and pushed a tightly plastic-wrapped, large, oddly-shaped package at Arcade. It made an audible thump as he tossed it on the table. The doctor looked down, then up to Aberdeen questioningly. 

“God damn it, just open it.”

With no further words, Arcade carefully tore the package open to reveal a set of armor not unlike that of the courier’s. Upon Arcade examining it, Aberdeen spoke again. 

“Why don’t you come with me?”


	3. Non Facias Malum ut Inde Fiat Bonum

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He has heard the gospel, but the church finds itself empty.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> consistency, I don't have it.

“Why don’t you come with me?”

Between the two men sat a long period of silence. Arcade turned the helmet of the riot gear over in his hands a few times, feeling the weight of it, humming at the possibilities presented to him. Aberdeen patiently sat, fingers folded across his torso in a relaxed stance.

“Well,” the doctor finally sighed, “I have a few questions, first.”

“Shoot.”

“One, why do you have a spare set of this armor? Two, where did you keep it to return so quickly? Three, why me?” Arcade had a look of... bewilderment. All of this was happening so quickly. “And I have a fourth, depending on your answers to the previous ones.”

Aberdeen sucked in a breath. “Well,” he sighed out, “it’s always a good idea to have a spare set of armor around in case yours starts to fall apart - which mine has - but I figure, it’s been the best set of armor I’ve ever had and probably will ever have save for a set of power armor, which I’m not even able to use anyway.

“To answer your second question, I had it stored nearby in McCarran. They owed me a few favors so I’ve got a little temporary setup over there since it isn’t exactly easy to travel to and from Novac every night for some decent sleep. Can’t sleep with all the lights and noise of the Strip right on my doorstep, personally, so a short walk is fine by me.

“And third...” The courier paused. Underneath his own mask, his lips were stretched taut. Why  _did_  he want to travel with Arcade? “You said I needed a friend. I think we could be friends.”

“Aren’t you blunt.”

“I seem to be getting that a lot today. Are you people not used to honesty, or something?”

Arcade snickered. “Unfortunately, we aren’t. Around here we get a lot of addicts, gamblers, and youth who are always trying to find an excuse for what’s happened to them.” With this, he sighed, finally setting the helmet down. He noticed something carved into the back of it - the word FORGIVE, just like that. He briefly wondered what that meant. 

“You said you had another question,” the courier interrupted his thoughts. “Hopefully I answered you in a way that allows it to be asked.”

“Well, Courier, I’ve heard of what you’ve done. Everyone talks about it - talks about you, I should say. How you found a way to peacefully settle what would have been a bloody battle in Goodsprings, right after you crawled back from death’s grip. How you got Primm back into working shape.” The name of Primm made Aberdeen wince, and it was a good thing Arcade couldn’t see his face. Aberdeen could only think, in that quick moment, of the eyebot that had been in his life so briefly. The doctor continued, “Providing medical relief to various NCR camps, farms, villages, and you’ve gained quite the reputation in the Legion, as well. My question is, with all the help you’ve given to others, do you plan to continue that in Freeside?”

“Of course,” replied the courier without hesitation. “I’ve seen... I’ve seen what war can do to a man. What the wastes can turn people into. The people of Freeside are no different. If the Legion had an ounce of basic human respect in their blood, I would be giving them the same treatment.” He sounded bitter about this, like he had lost an old friend to Caesar's reign. “The NCR has its faults, and quite frankly, if the Followers were in charge of everything... this world would be a better place,” he finished quietly.

“We’re not all that perfect,” Arcade admitted. “Caesar was once one of the Followers. Before my time, of course. He wanted to rebuild a new world in the image of the old. A sad story of good intentions gone bad. In that regard, he’s hardly unique.  If you set aside his leadership capabilities, extensive knowledge, and ruthless cunning... he's just another jerk who steps on people to get his way." He shook his head, rustling the hair that he had managed to relax back down on his head from right-out curly q’s to something a little more manageable. “If the Followers can produce such a man, then-”

“Then you are not at fault,” assured the courier. “As a whole, I mean.”

“We know that, just... abundans cautela non nocet.”

“Fair enough, I suppose. Don’t let that caution get in your way of pursuing what is right, though.”

“You- you speak Latin?” Arcade sputtered.

“Semper paratus,” Aberdeen said with a wink, who then realized that he still had not removed his mask. “It was more out of necessity than anything.”

“What could have possibly- you know what, no,” Arcade slapped a hand down on the table. “Actually, I don’t even care. From your actions alone, I can say - with strength - that I will come with you. I’m not sure what help I’ll be out there, but... Something in my gut tells me this is right.”

Somewhere, in another area of the Fort, Julie Farkas was hit with a sudden and great wave of relief and joy.

“But.. one last question.”

“Hit me.”

“Uh, do I have to wear this?”

“It’d make me happy if you did. It’s a security measure. You won’t be protected from Fiends - or the rain - in that lousy lab coat of yours.”

Arcade looked down at his coat. It hadn’t been washed, in, well, probably a few years, if he had to be honest with himself, and running out into the rain that morning didn’t count. It was actually still a bit moist, as the lone radiator in the room only worked so often, and when it did, it was barely enough to keep one from shivering, much less able to dry anyone. Even so, the doctor felt almost insulted.

“What’s wrong with my lousy lab coat?” He grinned at his childish joke, stripping it away to rest against the back of his chair.

“Yeesh, if I’d known you were that attached, I’d’ve found someone to perform marriage rights for you,” the courier was quick to retort. The two men shared a chuckle. “I’ll get out of your hair to let you change. You’ll want a dry set of clothing underneath that too - it chafes like the devil.”

“Noted.”

* * *

 

Aberdeen’s Pip-Boy chimed, signaling noon. He really wished he could figure out how to turn that off, as it’s ruined a number of covert missions. He snorted at the thought of that phrase, thinking back to pre-war spy holotapes. He’d seen a few in the Big Empty, before he ditched that place. Soon he’d have to return on his monthly trip there, though, if not for the fear of the wrath of the Toaster, but to check in on everyone. 

The last three-ish (nearly four, in a few days) months had been eventful, every day packed with fighting, not sleeping, and a load of things he truly didn’t understand. It was right after the bullet had been lodged in his head that Aberdeen found paths that lead outside the Mojave. A week, at best. He vowed never to listen to another strange radio signal again, because a month and a half each in the Big Empty and dealing with the droning on of a voice he’d come to hate gave him a bitter taste in his mouth. Long had he wished just to taste the copper sands of the Mojave on his tongue again.

Under the cover of a mostly dry overhang, the courier lit a cigarette. He wondered if the good doctors here in the Fort would chastise him for such an activity, but as soon as the nicotine hit his brain, the thought dispelled and flew away in a puff of exhaled smoke. He let the next inhale simmer in his lungs as he stared into the relentless rain. 

 _What am I going to do today,_  he thought.  _More importantly, what is taking him so long?_

Arcade should have been finished dressing himself by now. The courier gave him the benefit of the doubt, thinking that not as many people would be ready to go as quickly as he would be. For now, the courier sat on the lone, rain-moistened stool, elbow propped on a table. There was an ashtray, a radio, and a few playing cards turned indecipherable by the water. Lightning flashed overhead, followed by the cursing rumble of thunder, and the radio, to the courier’s astonishment, flickered to life. 

Like earlier, he couldn’t really hear it, but he heard the unfamiliar words “Sierra Madre” and reached to turn the volume up. Leaning in, he could make out the broadcast.

“... s inviting you to begin again. Come to a place where wealth, excitement and intrigue await around every corner. Stroll along the winding streets of our beautiful resort, make new friends, or rekindle old flames. Let your eyes take in the luxurious expanse of the open desert under clear star-lit skies. Gaze straight on into the sunset from our villa rooftops. Countless diversions await: Gamble in our casino, take in the theater, or stay in one of our exclusive executive suites that will shelter you and cater to your every whim. So if life's worries have weighed you down, if you need an escape from your troubles, or if you just need an opportunity to begin again, join us, let go, and leave the world behind at the Sierra Madre grand opening this October... We'll be waiting." 

There was about thirty seconds of buffer silence before the dialogue repeated.

“Oh, hell naw,” he scoffed, smacking the radio off. 

“Something the matter?” The suddenness of Arcade’s voice made the courier jump with a yelp. Arcade chuckled. “Didn’t mean to scare you.” The doctor now looked nearly identical to the courier in his riot gear, and, Aberdeen noticed, he had a plasma pistol strapped to his side. 

“No, just...” Aberdeen hesitated. “You ever hear of a place called the Sierra Madre?”

“Hm... Yes, on the radio, and in passing some time ago from... someone I used to know.” He was omitting something there on purpose, but Aberdeen didn’t want to pry. “Why do you ask?”

“Just heard it myself on the radio here,” he gestured to the radio with a now-broken switch. 

“Think the signal might be worth checking out?”

“Aren’t you eager to get out and about. No, I’ve had my fun following lost signals. I have other things to do. So, who around here needs some help?”


	4. Ace in the Hole, Part One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some good deeds. Some observing. And a way to throw his money into the pot.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> we're getting there, slowly but surely.

The rain turned the residents of Freeside into a huddled mass, shivering around garbage fires, begging for the flames to not die. Those lucky enough to stay indoors even felt the cold seeping inwards, and tried to keep moving about so they wouldn’t freeze in place. The extremes in temperatures was the fourth largest cause of death in the Mojave, after warfare, chem addiction, and mutated animal attacks. Even radiation poisoning was rarer than it, as the bombs never hit the greater New Vegas area.

Thanks to Mr. House. His name got passed around Freeside, in rumors and questions. Today, the name was delivered by the courier, as if he were doing his job, or something.

Arcade helped Aberdeen answer all the questions he possibly could about the mysterious figure looming over the Strip, way up high in his lofty fortress of the Lucky 38. In truth, Arcade didn’t know much. No one really did. 

Not much help was to be sought on this dreary day: only dissidents, druggies, and down-on-their-timers were dawdling about in rare dry spots and seeking shelter, which with a few thousand caps and some smooth talking, the courier was able to provide for most of them who would take the help. No one would say no to a warm, dry bed or couch. Hell, even a chair would do.

Arcade rarely got outside the Fort, much less out of Freeside. He was astounded at the generosity this Wasteland Pariah. Yes, he had heard rumors, but… This went beyond anything he’d ever seen.

“Where did you make so much money?” He had finally asked after handing the Garrets a hefty bag of caps.

“I’ve collected a number of rare weapons in my travels, and the Gun Runners are at no short of caps. Plus,” he leaned in, back of his hand covering his mouth to whisper, “I may or may not have won a couple dozen games of caravan at high stakes.”

“You absolute devil,” replied Arcade facetiously. Aberdeen grinned at this. He had a habit of taking his helmet off whenever he entered a building or residence - perhaps Old World manners got the best of him, thought the doctor, though the courier didn’t remove it previous to that afternoon when he asked for his companionship. Mayhaps, it was the rush of the situation. 

Arcade, behind the veil of the helmet, stared at Courier Six, memorizing every inch of his face while the helmet was off. His lips were cracked and dry, probably due to dehydration, fixed easily enough. His nose had a crook in it that indicated it had been broken once, and improperly set. Across his face, diagonally set, wide on the bottom right and thinning towards the top left was a fresh pink scar, like something had taken an upward swipe at him. Arcade wanted to ask what, exactly, but it had deathclaw written all over it. He had a five o’clock shadow dusting his chin, and a thin outline around his head, partially covered by a disconnected hairstyle drawn into long, thin dreadlocks. It looked too perfect to be just part of the hairstyle, thought Arcade, especially with the fuzzy beginnings of a shaved head beginning to grow out. What exactly happened there? And, just above where the deathclaw scar ended, was a pocketed scar. The bullet wound. Memory loss, maybe some motor dysfunction, speech problems. But Courier? Seemed to be doing just fine, with only the memory loss. His voice, he noticed, was slightly cracked and had a low vocal fry, but was not entirely unpleasant to listen to.

Arcade wondered what kind of person he was before that. Wondered if he, too, had a past that he’d rather keep behind him, and if it were for the best. The doctor kept quiet during most of the interactions the Courier had with the residents of Freeside, only piping up with random knowledge of the Old World and the people he should probably stay away from. At this, Aberdeen barked a laugh.

“Hon, if I was worried about some Freeside thug coming after me with a knife, I’d’ve been long dead. I can handle myself,” he said with a wink. It was the first time anyone had called Arcade a pet name in a while, though the doctor knew Aberdeen said it in jest. 

The last place to visit was Mick & Ralph’s. It had turned over to the late afternoon, and still the rain showed no signs of stopping. The pair stepped through the threshold, finding it much like any other place in Freeside: littered with buckets  that one had to be careful not to trip over. 

“Welcome,” popped up a surprised, bored-looking, albeit friendly, face. “First customers we’ve had all day! I’m Ralph. Mick is sick today, so if you’re looking for weapons, I’ll do my best but I’m not real smart in that area.”

“No worries,” waved Aberdeen. A second glance to the pair made Ralph have an intimidated look on his face, that is, until, the courier took his helmet off. “Name’s Courier Six. Pleased to meet you,” he reached a hand out. Ralph took it cautiously; not many people so pleasantly offered a handshake, though Arcade had seen it a dozen times already today. Was he offered one? No. This lead him to have a see a bit of green, perish the thought. He didn’t know, however, that Julie had also not been offered a handshake. Truth is, Aberdeen just doesn’t always think so well first thing in the morning.

“Interesting name. How can I help you today, folks?”

“We’re inquiring around about a few people. Namely a Benny fellow and Mr. House. Know anything about them?”

“Mr. House? Well, everyone knows about him. Defended the Strip from the bombs with his missiles. Pretty sure a few ghouls around here are old enough to remember witnessing the sight. Though, not too many folk around here hold him in high regards, since his securitrons can be real jerks and he holes himself up in the Lucky 38. Or, so we think, ‘cause no one’s ever been in there since before the war.”

“Mm,” Aberdeen hummed noncommittally. He had heard bits and pieces of this elsewhere, so it was old news. “And Benny?”

“Only Benny I know of is Benny Gecko. Strange name, innit? Well, he’s over at the Tops. They’re a real friendly bunch, seem to actually care about the enjoyment of the people coming in and out of their place. An everyman casino.”

“Real friendly, my ass,” the courier grunted. “Benny put a bullet in my head, and I’m not exactly looking to be friends with him.”

“Sounds like what you need is a passport into the Strip, then.”

“A… passport?”

Arcade interjected. “Securitrons around the front gate of the Strip require either a ‘credit check’,” he included air quotations, “meaning bribe them to get in, or a passport to get inside. I’ve seen a few intellectuals get past without anything at all, though, so maybe robotics experts know the thing to rattle off to let them in.”

“Really now?” Ralph turned towards the doctor. “That’s good info there. I can help out more people by maybe selling that passcode of sorts to ‘em.”

“So you help people get into the strip, then?” Aberdeen crossed his arms.

“Ah… you caught me,” Ralph raised his hands. “I am very good at faking certain… documents. Legal ones, you know the type. My going rate is 500 caps for a passport.”

Aberdeen pondered this for a moment. That would mean 1000 caps to the man, nothing compared to the good will he’d handed out earlier, but to this end, Aberdeen couldn’t justify it. A selfish means to a selfish end. 

“Take your time. If you can find another way into the Strip, be my guest, but let me in on your secret, eh?”


	5. Ace in the Hole, Part Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Less talking, more revenging.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter took way longer than it should have because my friends are distracting little assholes. on another note, the chapters i may put out tomorrow will delayed, due in great part to my full-time job that does not require me to use a computer. I'll be bringing my laptop to work, but not much writing will get done should I be bothered during my breaks. Enjoy.

Arcade took the courier aside, speaking in hushed tones, pretending to peruse the gun selection lain out on the opposite end of the store.

“Exactly how much do you know about robots, or anything scientific?”

“Not to brag, but a hell of a lot.”

The doctor studied his companion’s face. “So why do you look like you’re considering buying a passport off of Ralph?”

“Ehhh… I’d consider it to be giving him business of some sort,” he shrugged. 

“You’re giving him plenty by keeping his customers alive. Keep your caps, put them - put them towards something else.”

“But on the off-chance that whatever I do to the Securitrons doesn’t work-”

“Didn’t you say something earlier about not letting caution get ahead of you?” The men stared at each other, the courier in a stumped silence. 

“Boy, you got me there. Way to use my words against me.” The courier chuckled, shamefully scratching at the back of his head with his free hand, the other still gripping onto his helmet. That hand was shaking, perhaps out of the thought that followed. “How is that suiting you, by the way? You’re uh, quite a bit taller than me-” by a good five inches “-so I was afraid it might be a bit tight on you.”

“There’s enough stretch in the fabric for me, but it feels muggy inside the helmet.”

“You  _can_  take it off, you know.”

“I know. Just… want to get used to it first.”

“Aye. What say you we get out of here and make the Strip our bitch?”

“I… wouldn’t exactly put it that way, but certainly, let us depart.”

“Lets.”

* * *

 

“Hoo-wee, that was a  _total_  pushover,” Aberdeen laughed anxiously, pushing out a sigh of relief at the same time. 

“I didn’t think that’d actually work…”

“Doubting me already, Arcade? Tsk tsk,” the courier wagged his finger disapprovingly. “You’ll find that Sixer is full of surprises. Actually, in this weather? I’d be damned if we couldn’t have just snuck right past the bots.”

“They physically had to unlock the gate for us, Courier.”

“Pssh, pickpocketing is a thing.”

Arcade was starting to have doubts about his companion. He didn’t respond, only walked further into the strip.

“Well, butter my butt and call me a biscuit, if it ain’t ol’ Aberdeen!” A stereotypical cowboy voice came screaming through the rain.

“Aw, shit,” spat the courier. “God damn it- Victor, is that you? I told you not to call me that!”

“Your name is Aberdeen?” Arcade tilted his head towards his companion.

“Shut up.”

“Well, I reckon that after diggin’ you outta that grave, you’d call me a friend o’ yers.”

“Yeah I don’t consider a robot that’s been tailing me through the Mojave to be a friend. It’s weird, and it’s creepy, Victor.” 

Arcade could make out the shape of a Securitron looming over the both of them, but instead of a cartoony police man face on it, a cartoony cheerful cowboy face was plastered on the flickering screen. The brightness of it made it possible to see, when one could hardly see a few feet in front of them. The brightness, in general, on the strip made it possible for one to find themselves at the casino of their choosing, but maybe with a fractured ankle or two.

“Speakin’ of, you’ve come a far piece haven’t you? Welcome to New Vegas!” The screen on the Securitron- Victor- flashed to what looked like confetti. 

“What are you doing here?” The irritation in his voice was venomous, but Securitrons are noticeably wonderful at not picking up on tonal shifts.

“Consider me your personal welcome wagon! Now hear this - the head honcho of New Vegas, Mr. House, is itchin’ to make your acquaintance.”

“Somehow, I’m not surprised.” A lump formed in Arcade’s stomach. He didn’t sign up for  _this._ Not in a million years. And this was just day one. The doctor made a silent prayer to a god he didn’t believe in. “Why is a robot passing on the invitation?”

“Well now, it was Mr. House who made Securitrons like me. Seems the least I could do is pass on his message. Don’t dawdle. He’ll be waiting.”

“Mm.” He was noncommittal. With that, the cowboy Securitron wheeled away, its silhouette pronounced against the light of the Lucky 38. 

“Aberdeen,” the doctor repeated, searching his mind. “Can’t say I know the origin.”

“Scottish Gaelic. Romans referred to the city as Aberdonia. Don’t ask why I know that.” He shrugged his shoulders forward, moving away from the Lucky 38, towards the faint outline of the Tops. “C’mon, let’s get going. I have a date with a gecko-faced asshole.” Arcade breathed a sigh of relief that they weren't going inside the abandoned, and probably haunted, tower.

“Can I ask you why you didn’t tell me your…” he searched the word for it. “Given name?” He didn’t want to say birth name, because that may be untrue. Given name, he figured, sounded nicer, as the courier may have given it to himself.

“I only let friends call me that.” And people who majestically knew his name from before the bullet wiped his memory.

“Didn’t you say you thought we could be friends?”

“That I did, but it’s only day one. Figured we were still on the ‘acquaintances’ step. You gonna throw my words back at me all day, or what?” Arcade didn’t respond. They came upon another gate, but no passport, passing of caps, or passcode was needed to go through it. It squealed on its hinges. With how rich New Vegas was, one would figure that they could afford to deal with some of the infrastructure. But no one really cared about that anymore, not after the bombs fell.

* * *

 

The Tops casino was, by and far, the most welcoming place on the strip. The Chairmen made sure of that - the less discerning they were of their guests, the more money they could pull in. Anyone and everyone can find anything and everything they need right there. Booze at the bars, bets on the floor, butts in the bedrooms, and a bass strumming up in the Aces Theater. You could say that at just about any other casino on the Strip, but there was something special about the Tops.

The pair stood under the large overhang outside the Tops, brushing as much water as they could off each other. Surely the Chairmen would appreciate not having to clean any more water off their floors. Arcade appreciated the polite gesture, even if there was some filth that ran in the bloods of the casino operators and staff. When dry enough to not be like soaked dogs, the men removed their helmets and passed through the doors. The Chairman up front, wearing a crudely fashioned name tag that read “SWANK” asked for their weapons. 

“Been a crazy day today, though,” he mentioned. “Careful about bumping into some of these folk, they might have fashioned a shiv. Now, how can I direct you, baby?”

“I’m lookin’ for a pal of mine.” Aberdeen fished something from out of a pocket on the inside of his duster jacket. Out came a lighter. Swank’s eyes lit up in recognition, and despair. “Dropped his lighter right outside Goodsprings.”

“…Benny’s just round that corner there. Don’t start any trouble now, you hear?”

“No trouble to be found,” he confidently lied with a smile. “Just a talk between two friends.”

“Alright, alright,” he shooed them off. “Have a good time, baby.”

The casino was everything that the two had heard of, and then some. Surely the other casinos in the area were quite a deal better - as even if this were an ‘everyman’ casino, it still heavily relied on a male customer base. Women, too, were everywhere, few on their own - the rest dangling on the elbows of crooked-toothed smiles and greasy palms. And still, over the laughter, the faint sounds of Sinatra humming away on the speaker system, and slot machines, a faint drum of rain could be heard. 

“You know I know that you’re not telling the truth,” Arcade murmured to the courier. “You’ve got something hidden on you that you didn’t let them have. You plan to-” he glanced around, dropping his voice even lower, “-you plan to spill blood on this floor, don’t you.”

“Don’t you worry your pretty little face about it,” Aberdeen clapped a reassuring hand on Arcade’s shoulder. The doctor felt his face flush, similar to this morning’s flirtatious words, the words carried the same weight. “I’ll make sure it’s done in private.”

“Are you sure this revenge mission is the right thing to do?”

Aberdeen didn’t reply, only giving his companion a cold, steely glare. The dead-set look in his eyes said it all: he was determined to do this, one way or another. Then like the flick of a switch, his smile was back, like Arcade hadn’t said anything at all. The courier went rifling through his pockets again. 

“Ah, shit where did I- aha!” He pulled out a small bag, rattling with the distinct sound of caps. “This might take a while. Here, take this, go have a drink or something to eat. Hell, gamble a little, if that’s your thing, you might earn me it back and then some.” He dropped the bag into Arcade’s empty, upturned helmet dangling in his right hand. Just down at the end of the room was a man in an ugly suit jacket. Once again, Aberdeen turned to a face of stone. “That’s him alright. I’d recognize that shitty haircut from a mile away. I’ll be back.”

“Aberdeen-” but he was already off to a brisk pace, determination in his step. “Be careful,” he said to empty air. Alone in a crowded room, Arcade turned about-face to hand the caps over for money. As he walked away, he heard a loud voice from behind.

“What in the god damn…”

* * *

 

Courier Six was not known to forgive those who wronged him. He was a man knowledgeable in the medicinal arts,  _premium non nocere._  First, do no harm. But take no shit. He was also very knowledgeable about being a little sneak. There was a real fear of those lobotomites lodged into him, but they were imperceptive as fuck, so he could sneak right up to them, put a live grenade in their back pockets, and get out of harm’s way before they could even make a grunt. To this end, he had packed very well onto his body a silenced .22 pistol. Nothing fancy, just enough to get the job done. Even Arcade hadn't noticed while he was wiping the water from the courier's back.

With the same lighter Benny had left, he lit a cigarette at the bar of the Presidential Suite over the freshly made corpse of one Benny Gecko; a clean, single shot to the center of the man’s forehead.

He took a deep draw in, and exhaled, “Well. Ain’t that a kick in the head?” He chuckled. Deep inside him, that feeling of depression welled again. No, he would not mourn the man who begged to get away alive, to work a deal out, who would inevitably leave him for dead once again. No, this feeling came from a deeper place, a place of knowing that even after finding his revenge, Aberdeen was not at peace. He would feel this emptiness inside him for a long, long time. He would pull a bottle of scotch out from behind that bar, pop it open, take a swig, and finish his cigarette. He would prop old Benny Gecko, bless his pretty face and wretched soul, up on one of the couches, empty his pockets without bothering to look at the contents, and fire a round from the gun the slithering cretin had hidden on himself into a discrete area of the suite. He would take another swig of scotch, and shut the eyelids of Benny, the listless color in them filled with the sight of the man they had interpreted to be dead. The gun, engraved with a depiction of Mother Mary, he thought, would be best placed in Benny’s dominant hand. He would frame it as a suicide. No note. No explanation. 

There would be rumors that the guilt of what Benny had done had caught up to him after facing he who had escaped death, and he took his own life. Others would be right in assuming that it was Aberdeen himself who had taken the Chairman’s life, and set up the suicide angle. No matter what angle one believed, people for years afterwards would swear that they could hear the sound of Benny’s laugh in the corridors of the Tops on rainy days for many, many years to come. 

Aberdeen would take that bottle of scotch back down to the lobby with him, he thought, to share in celebration with Arcade. They would get fuzzied up from the alcohol, eat a nice steak, crash in the High Roller’s Suite after a band of good luck on Arcade’s end, and depart for the Mojave in the morning, where a blood-red sun would rise heavy from the previous day’s humidity to turn the wasteland a dry, barren landscape once again.


	6. Determination

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alt title: It's a whole lot of nothing! Disappointment fills the air, choking the courier. Or maybe it's just some dust.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> if i ask for money for a pizza would someone send me it  
> on another note, I'll be editing the timeline of this just a tad tomorrow. doesn't feel like it should have been that short a time. also, in my canon, after the events of lonesome road, Aberdeen believes that ED-E is gone for good, because he never bothers to ask the clone why it's out in the divide. he didn't return to Primm.  
> I'll make a timeline one day. also, courier six is ncr aligned, for now. he won't become legion, don't worry.

“Aber- Courier,” The doctor corrected himself, “do you intend to take up Mr. House on his request?”

“Absolutely! ...Not. You are allowed to call me Aberdeen, you know. I won't get mad.”

“I just wasn't sure, is all.” Arcade reached up to wipe the sleep from his eyes, remembering on contact with his helmet that he wasn't able to. The courier had fashioned them both a way to hang their helmets from their necks, freeing their hands in case of attack, but Arcade was on the paler side and feared sunburn more than he probably should.

“After last night? Pff,” Aberdeen waved a dismissive hand. “Man, you could call yourself my best friend after all that money you won us. How'd you do it? Even my luck isn't that good.” The doctor merely shrugged.

“Couldn't tell you. First time in a while I really cut loose, too. I ought to thank you for that.”

“Nah, don't think of it. You deserved it. We both did.”

“I don't mean to pry, but... I assume your mission went the way you intended it to.”

The courier stopped in his tracks. They had set out of the Strip early that morning, headed south. Before they even could get off the premises of The Tops, someone stopped them – a spy of the Legion. He granted the courier the mark of Caesar, as the leader of the most feared group in the Mojave and outlying regions  (save for the former Enclave) wished to speak to Courier Six himself. Aberdeen had intended to go south, anyway, but not out to Cottonwood Cove. He had Primm set in mind, which was very much west of the eastern dock town. Arcade argued with him about it, but Aberdeen shot him down – he had business elsewhere in the region, regardless. Plus, it was just a bit south of Novac. He could get a rest in his own bed, for once. Afterwards, they stopped in at the Silver Rush to pick up some  extra microfusion cells and to get Aberdeen's -  _“What was it called again?” “A LAER. Laser-assisted electrical rifle. Picked it up out in the Big Empty. This one's modified, though.” “What is a Big Empty?” “Sigh.”_  repaired. It was his main weapon of choice, but it had seen better days. Arcade was basically a kid in a candy shop in that place, giddy as can be. Boy had a thing for energy weapons, it seemed, and the courier took note of that.

“Aberdeen?”

“Sorry. Got lost in thought there. Guess you could say it did,” he picked up the pace again. “We got a long walk ahead of us. Do you mind if we stop in a few places that've caught my eye?”

“I don't see why not.”

“Good. Also, do you mind if I turn on the radio? I hate long periods of silence. Drives me nuts.”

“Again, go right ahead.”

* * *

It was mid afternoon by the time they reached the REPCONN headquarters. Aberdeen was stiff from a previous fight with some Fiends earlier, and now there were loads of robots lying in wait ahead of them.

“I know this place, some of the history behind it,” commented Arcade. He prattled on a bit about it as they approached. “What are we here for?”

“Well, I had a... friend, yeah, a friend, who needed some repairs done on an old eyebot.”

“What, like the ones the Enclave used?”

“One and the same. I got the repairs done, but... Something happened to the eyebot, and I'm just wondering if I can find anything I need to get it back in operable shape.” Aberdeen was leaving something out on purpose. The men both had their secrets, and that was fine, but Arcade's suspicion was heightened by this. Did he, too, have connections to the Enclave? No. No way, impossible. Something was... off about this.

“We might be able to take a rest here, too. Granted nothing inside decides to shoot at us. C'mon.”

The men entered the facility. A Mr. Handy greeted them, offering them a tour. The corpses of a few Fiends lay in the main lobby area. Guess they declined a the tour in a less-than-friendly fashion. Aberdeen looked over to Arcade. “You wanna give this old rust bucket some purpose?”

“Oh, I'd love to!” His enthusiasm was boundless. The old bot led them through a set of double doors into a room filled display cases and old, err, safety barrels. Nothing interesting, as all the barrels were empty and even the vials of 'plasma' were just colored, slightly irradiated, water. The next room had models of rockets, again, nothing actually interesting to the courier, though Arcade was filled with glee and reading every plaque.

“This is so interesting – much of it is a bunch of pre-war bureaucratic malarkey – but the technology that's since progressed from this point... astounding, how even in the aftermath of a nuclear apocalypse, mankind continues to push forward.”

Though Aberdeen wanted to say something wise in response, he merely gave a light punch to the doctor's shoulder. “Nerd.”

“The geek shall inherit the Earth!” It was said with a smile, even if Arcade's face could not be seen.

“ _'Blessed are the meek; for they shall inherit the Earth.'_  Matthew, 5:5.”

“When's the last time you read the Bible?”

“A little too recently.” An odd moment it was, when he came across that Bible cached deep within a desk that had been laying underground for years. He strained to read it in the blood-red light trickling through a crack, an ironic prayer that it would put his mind at ease and he could sleep within that buried building and nothing would come to eat him during his restless dreams.

There was an uncomfortable pause. “It was a nice joke, though,” the courier chuckled. “Guess I just have a bad sense of humor when I'm focused.”

Already the Mr. Handy had progressed to the third room of the tour, and through the doors the courier could see what he wanted: a standard, albeit ancient, eyebot. His heart sank upon approaching it, however. Much like everything else on the tour, it was but a hollow replica of the real thing.

“ED-E might never be repaired,” he murmured to himself.  _Even if he could,_  he thought,  _would it be the same ED-E after he exploded like that?_ “Fuck!”

“Pardon me, sir,” the Mr. Handy said, “I'll have to ask you to refrain from using such language in the presence of the other rocketeers. Onwards, to the observatory!”

“Aberdeen, it doesn't take a genius to see that something's wrong, here.”

“It's nothing,” he muttered bitterly. “Literally. There's nothing here I can use. It's just a plastic piece of junk.”

“Do you think it'd be worth checking out the rest of the building? You know, in case they have a real one stashed away somewhere?” The courier shook his head, no. “Maybe there's something else in here, then, maybe you can find parts off another robot-”

“Arcade,” the man said softly. “I appreciate what you're trying to do. But unless there's a RobCo around these parts, I don't think I'll have any luck.”

“It'd make sense for there to be one, considering the owner of RobCo. I mean, he even bought REPCONN out. Doesn't make much sense to me.”

“Wait, who's the owner of RobCo?”

Arcade turned to stare at his companion. “I was literally talking about it less than fifteen minutes ago. Were you not listening?”

“...No.” The punch Aberdeen had given the doctor earlier was returned.

“Asshole.”

“Takes one to know one.”

“Don't deflect. Your poor listening skills are a sign of misdirected focus. If you hyper-focus on one thing, then you'll miss out on all the rest. Also, it makes you look like a jerk. Listen to your friends when they talk to you.”

“Okay, okay, I'm sorry, I'll do better to do that from now on.”

“You better.”

* * *

Plans changed after that to make headway for the 188 trading post. It was considerably safer than an abandoned building, filled with robots who could mistake the pair for intruders. On the way, Aberdeen listened to how the founder of RobCo was a Robert House, who may very well be the same Mr. House that runs New Vegas now. Or some decedent of the original. Something like that. RobCo had bought out REPCONN to get into the aerospace business, because, why not?

Dusk was starting to settle on the horizon. One thing Arcade noticed was that his companion was the type to stop and smell the roses – if roses grew out here, that was. Figure of speech aside, when there was something worth looking at, Courier Six would pause to stare, removing his helmet to take it in. And the sunsets around here were always worth looking at. It blasted the skies in hues of pink and orange, a deep, dark blue creeping in like capillary action. The clouds were never the same, or often just not there, and on the horizon, buildings melted into mountains.

The duo briefly wondered, without speaking, if that was what it looked like on impact of an atomic bomb. People were just dying to see it! The courier chastised himself for such dark humor.

“Aberdeen?”

“Hm?”

“How's your eyesight, with that injury?”

He reached up and gently traced over his left eye. He could barely open it, but by the grace of God, it hadn't been actually harmed. The deathclaw that had ruined his once devilishly handsome face had only gotten to swipe across the bridge of his nose, skipping just barely over the eye itself, and up over his brow. Most his eyelid and socket were scarred, making it difficult to lift the lid.

“Not great. My depth perception is off.”

“Not that anyone could tell with the way you were shooting earlier.” He glanced over to see his companion smirking.

“My peripherals, too. Can't tell you how many times afterwards ED-E would sneak up on me.” He had said it casually, without thinking, as if Arcade would know who he was talking about.

“Eddie?”It was pronounced with less of a pause between syllables, the way Six had done it. “Was... that a friend of yours?”

So he didn't hear him in REPCONN.

“...” He was angry. He had slipped. He hated what had happened out in the Divide. He hated thinking about how he ruined so many lives, and then another fell before him to stop it from happening again. It scrambled his brain. The wind-whipped, isolated land, pocketed with craters from detonated warheads. Tunnels seeking to drag him into a poisonous den. Ulysses, taunting him. He was a fool to follow the signs.  _You can go home, Courier Six!_  But he wouldn't. Not until he reached the end. And, in the end, the only thing keeping him going was gone, all because he was too cowardly to seek the missiles on the Legion.

“A lover, then,” Gannon concluded with a smug tone. “Didn't take you to be the romantic type.”

“He was  _not_  a lover!” The courier stopped and pivoted in his tracks, reaching out to the doctor. “You don't speak of ED-E from here on,  _cogitesne_?!” His fist had closed around the edges of the duster. Despite Arcade's near half foot of height on the courier, he was dwarfened.

The rage radiating off the courier was palpable. Arcade had felt this fear only a few times before. And then, after a rather pregnant pause, his face sofened, but not to one of a joke, or joy, but to that of abject horror.

“Oh... oh, God,” he dropped his companion, stumbling a few steps backwards. “Arcade, God, I'm so sorry, I... I shouldn't have...”

“I overstepped.” The blonde haired man finally spoke, having caught a breath. “I made light of something that was obviously a serious situation. I deserved it.”

“You did not,” the other croaked. Was he... crying? No, but looked like he was about to. “Fuck.”

This time, there was no Mr. Handy to ask him to mind his manners. Arcade didn't mind. This was the first of many lessons the courier would teach him.

“Let's just... get going, alright? You can talk about it when you're ready.” He reached a tentative hand out to touch the shoulder of Aberdeen, but retracted it. “If you're ready,” he corrected himself.

Aberdeen grasped Gannon's hand, surprising the doctor. It was a handshake-type hold, a promise. They nodded to one another, and trekked down the road to the 188.

That night, Aberdeen would not sleep, only lay flat on his back, staring at an endless abyss of stars. Arcade would remember the feel of Aberdeen's hand, the blisters on exposed fingertips, the carefully filed nails, the welcoming and sorry seeping into him, opposite of when it held him at the throat. He would, unlike the other, eventually fall asleep, a light snore rising from his chest.


	7. Backdoor Flush

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An unexpected coincidence.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> welcome to whose line is it anyway where everything is made up and canon doesn't matter

Aberdeen chewed on his cigarette, eyeing his competitor. His one caravan was close to being able to sell, while she had one within range. End game was nearing. Veronica studied her cards, deciding if she had any way of making this turn worth the small pile of caps in the center of the table. He had introduced himself to the Brotherhood Scribe not an hour beforehand, right about nine a.m. How Arcade was asleep when it was already an insufferable temperature out was beyond his understanding.

“Shit,” she swore, putting a queen down onto her pile of 19. “Got nothing that’ll help me here. Turn.”

“Aye,” he slapped his remaining 9 down. 23. Her eyes bugged out of her head. “Competitive, are we?”

“Don’t get too cocky, else I’ll punch you.” She traced the knuckles of her power fist.

Aberdeen was able to immediately clock her as Brotherhood, despite her underhanded attempts at playing coy. He’d seen them before, alright. Hidden Valley wasn’t so hidden, he’d learned after having an explosive collar affixed to his neck. It all turned out relatively okay, with him noping the fuck out of that place as soon as the Elder had set him loose.

“Turn.”

They had completed one game already; this one was double or nothing. Aberdeen may have a trick or two up his sleeve: meaning he was a dirty cheat. He grinned, watching Veronia frantically discarded one from her hand.

“Aberdeen?” The doctor’s befuddled voice called out.

“Over ‘ere,” he returned, taking a puff. “Morning, sunshine!” He had taken on a southern drawl to his accent. Yes, there was a twinge to it normally, but not to this thickness.

Another turn and it was game over, Veronia holding her head in defeat.

“Nooooo,” she whined. “You owe me a dress, you cheat!”

“Bahaha,” he laughed heartily.

“Aberdeen, are you tormenting this poor woman?”

“Naw, Arc, just havin’ a friendly hand of Caravan.” He gestured towards the woman, clad in a rather drab Scribe’s robe. “This 'ere’s Veronica. She’s a real beaut.” True to his word, Veronica, despite the hood of her robe covering her hair, was stunning. She had a smile that was bright with perfect teeth, a sign of growing up very privileged.

Veronica Santangelo was very lucky in that regard. “Unless you’re going to turn into a long-legged brunette, I’d dial down the flirting.” She laughed, gaining a smirk on the courier’s face.

“Don’t worry, I’m what ya might call a…” He fanned his hand around in circles, thinking of the phrase. “Confirmed bachelor?”

Ah, that confirmed it for Gannon. Because, as far as flirting was concerned, he was very, very bad at picking up any hints Aberdeen dropped, and acted naive to his overtness.

“What’s with the cowboy act, here?” The doctor leaned against a nearby beam that held up the main shack of the 188.

“Come on, doc, don’t ruin my fun.” And back to normal it was.

“That was an act? Could have fooled me,” Veronica laughed. “Nice to meet you…”

“Gannon. Arcade Gannon. I’m a doctor with the Followers.”

“Interesting name.”

“We get that a lot around here.”

Here being everywhere either of them had ever been.

“What’s a Follower doing out here? Outpost’s north-east of here.”

“We’re headed south,” Aberdeen replied for the other man.

“Cottonwood Cove,” the blonde responded bitterly. “This nitwit has it in his head to go speak to all-mighty Caesar himself.”

“Shit, no kidding?”

“Got his mark, so we’re pretty safe,” the courier fished it out of his pocket. The silver glinted in the sunlight. “We actually gotta get going pretty soon,” he started swiping the caps off the table and organizing his cards back together.

“Ah.” Veronica looked dejected. “Wish I could tag along.”

“To- to  _visit the fucking Legion?!”_ Aberdeen’s eyebrows shot up. “I know you Brotherhood types are pretty rough-and-tumble with bravery worn like hearts on your sleeves, but that’s insanity! Do you have any idea how they treat women out there?!”

To this, Veronica simply shrugged. “Beats sticking around here. Doesn’t matter much where I go, as long as it’s somewhere.”

“Aren’t you on a mission?” Her face dimmed a bit, smile escaping her lips.

“Technically, I guess. But I could consider this part of it!”

The men looked to each other thoughtfully. Between them, a silent discussion ensued.Sure, it’d only been a few days since Gannon himself was recruited. But in those event-packed days even he’d realized that another gun… err, fist, by their side would be an immense help.

“Please, I’ll even… Listen, I might like punching things, but I’m  _really_  good with weapons I know how to recycle and even convert things like microfusion cells, even build a few things or a few aid items.. There are places I'e never been to that’d be too dangerous for just me. What do you think? Maybe we could travel together, help each other out uh…” she looked up at them, realizing she was beginning to sound like a child, desperate for a parent’s attention. “I… know it sounds silly, having literally just met me, but…”

“And you, having just met us,” Arcade broke the silent conversation. Aberdeen was still staring at his partner, a reciprocated stare.

 _And you, Arcade, having just met me,_  the unspoken words hung in the air. Veronica didn’t know that. Frankly, Aberdeen didn’t care how long he’d known someone. Most of his gut instincts proved to be right so far. And his gut told him this much, and Arcade agreed:

“You can come with us.”

Veronica’s face lit up like a firework. Joy exploded onto her face and voice. “Really?! You’re sure? Three won’t be a crowd??” She took a deep breath and calmed herself as the men nodded an assuring approval to her. “Well,” she grinned wider, “thanks for taking a chance on a naive young girl from California with stars in her eyes and a pnematic gauntlet on her hand.”

“I mean, I took a damn big chance on crawling out of a grave and seeking revenge on some daisy-suit wearin’ sonofabitch,” chuckled Aberdeen. “Took an even bigger chance recruiting this fruit,” he jerked a thumb back in the direction of Gannon, “and so far it’s turning out alright.”

“Hey,” the doctor protested, crossing his arms defiantly. “You’re so drunk on fruit like me, you’re having sips with Dionysus!”

“Guilty as charged. Who’s Dionysus?”

“I have neither the time nor patience to explain Greek mythology to you.”

“Are you sure you two haven’t known each other for at  _least_  a decade?”

“Yes,” they replied simultaneously. There was a beat, and then the cackle of laughter rose up from the trading post between the three.

* * *

“Aberdeen.”

“Mm?”

“About what you said yesterday.”

The previous day had passed with rather minor occurrences: a few radscorpions here and there, and a lone coyote howling for its pack. They had made sure not to step off the road, because they all knew that cazadores lay in wait to the east. It was a slow-going trip, because one of Veronica’s many charms was stopping to look at every little thing. Aberdeen appreciated this aspect, and took in the sights as much as she did. Arcade, however, was a bit more on the impatient side, though he was in no rush to make it to the Fort, heart of the Legion’s operations, so he bit his tongue on asking them to get a move on. The trio had crashed inside the El Dorado gas station, because if they were to go to HELIOS One (much to the persistence on both of Aberdeen’s companions), it would be a day-long field trip. Sure, there were a few Viper gunslingers, but they were easily taken care of. They opted to sleep inside, dragging the bedrolls left behind for extra padding under their own, and Aberdeen set a few mines outside the door for extra protective cover.

“Gotta be more specific than that, darlin.”

“When you called me a fruit…” Arcade was trying to choose his words carefully. “I’m not offended, just surprised.”

“Well, I don’t know much about you besides what I infer. You could’ve just as easily denied it, you know.”

“I’m not very interesting, that’s why I don’t say anything. You’d find better stories off a Freeside junkie. And anyway, you don’t ask. You just listen to the radio all the time.”

“It’s soothing. We can talk  _over_  it, you know.”

The courier stirred a scramble of gecko eggs over the hot plate. It was breakfast time. Aberdeen’s Pip-Boy was set to the side, the low hum of Nat King Cole wafted from the radio. “So when I wake tomorrow, I’ll know our love was right,” the courier sang along, surprising his companion. Veronica stirred awake from the sound. “Kiss me as though it were now of never; teach me all that a heart should know. Love me as though there were no tomorrow; oh my darling, love me; don’t ever let me go.”

Arcade wanted to keep talking on the subject, but he was downright blown away. The soft beams of sunlight seeping into the gas station catching dust motes had hit Aberdeen’s face in just the right way to make the man, scarred from too many moons of travel, seem like an angel, with a voice that departed from the heavens itself.

“I didn’t know you could sing,” he spoke softly. “You’re incredible.” Veronica hummed an agreement from behind.

“Wouldn’t call it incredible. You just learn how to sound like what you’ve been listening to for god damned ever.”

The courier plated the scramble along with fresh apples for the three on some relatively clean dishes, ones he’d saved from Muggy, and served it to his companions. He paused for a minute while chewing on the overcooked eggs to consider the situation he’d landed himself in when the radio on his Pip-Boy changed.

 _“Has your life taken a turn? Do troubles beset you? Has fortune left you behind? If so, the Sierra Madre Casino, in all its glory, is inviting you to begin again.”_  The voice crackled over the speaker.

“Oh, God, not this again,” he groaned, and reached over to turn it off.

“Wait,” Veronica stopped him, earning her a glare. “No, you can turn it off, I was just about to say I’ve heard this before.”

“Yeah, it played yesterday while we were walking. Gotta fix this piece of shit radio, keeps switching to whatever it damn well likes…”

“Not just on the radio, I mean. Where have I heard that name before? Sierra Madre…” She chewed contemplatively. “Mind if I take a look at your Pip-Boy?”

“Go for it.” He tossed her the device.

She fiddled with it for a bit, keeping the volume down low while she toyed with the radio. It took her some time: the men were able to finish their food and clean up with a bottle of purified water and a sliver of soap before she came to any conclusion.

“Elijah! Father Elijah!” She finally exclaimed as her companions were putting their armor on and rolling up the bedrolls. Aberdeen’s head whipped back towards her. “He’d talked about it before he went AWOL on us, he-” The courier interrupted by stumbling forward in front of  her, onto his knees. He quickly pulled from his back his weapon of choice.

“You know Elijah,” he panted, turning the LAER over. “This – this was made by him.”

“How… what?” She tossed the Pip-Boy down and nabbed the LAER. “I’ve never even seen an energy weapon like this before I met you, and you’re telling me he  _made_  this?”

“Well, not exactly, here, let me explain.”

* * *

Aberdeen went about explaining the events of what happened in the Big Empty. Following a radio signal to the Mojave Drive-In after returning from the Divide – which, he told them both now that Arcade was listening in, was a story for another time that really messed him up. Being transported to the middle of a crater in some mountain where there was a battle between scientists that was all too reminiscent of a pre-war science fiction holotape. The experiments done on him and on the lobotomites and how awful all those scientists truly were. The Think Tank, Sink, the Auto-Doc, Muggy, Toaster, Lightswitches… And then, finally, how he’d found archives and caches of weapons and goods of someone named Elijah. Someone who had been to the Big Empty. He had been the only other person to escape the grasps of the Think Tank, though the first and only to do so without being lobotomized. The LAER, he explained, was tech of the Big Empty, but the one he’d nabbed was Elijah’s advanced version of it.

There was someone after him in the Big Empty, someone who was intent on finding him. Though to what end, Aberdeen didn’t know. Christine, he had recalled from a terminal entry. He had found armor that belonged to her, he said, in the Y-17 medical facility, with the name Christine Royce patched to the inside collar of it. Veronica didn’t know the name, to the dismay of Courier Six. Both companions found this information to be beyond interesting, and Aberdeen promised them both that one day, he would take them there, because aside from the lobotomites wreaking havoc, man-eating plants, cyber-dogs intent on tasting human flesh, cazadores as far as the eye can see, and deadly sentry bots every fifteen feet, it was a pretty great place and there was still plenty there left to discover.

In turn, Veronica told Aberdeen a little about Father Elijah. She was under his study as a protege, but found him to be rather brash and unpleasant to deal with. He also separated her and her girlfriend, to which Aberdeen wanted to respond with violence. Separating people from their loved ones was a big no-no in his book. He had ideals that sounded good on paper – give technology back to the people and relinquish the hold the NCR had on the people of the wasteland. The Brotherhood was opposed to that sort of thing, believing that tech should be kept out of the hands of normal people. Elijah even had been once operating out of HELIOS One. He figured that by getting ARCHEMEDIES back online, he could wipe the NCR out. The three of them grimaced at the thought of that. Even a Brotherhood Scribe and a man with hidden ties to the Enclave didn’t believe that the NCR deserved a fate as cruel as that.

“I guess that solidifies our plans for the day to go there, then,” Arcade finally spoke. He felt he had been a bit too silent in the conversation. This wasn’t unusual for him, to sit back and listen in, observe. “Though the NCR might have issues with a Brotherhood Scribe crossing onto their territory.”

“Bah,” Aberdeen scoffed, “they’ll let her in just based on my word alone. They owe me a bunch of favors.”

“If you say so.” Veronica, in that moment, felt like a small child, afraid of what would lay before her. “Another thing to note,” she finally passed the LAER back to Aberdeen, “is that the signal for that broadcast is close. Very close. We could track it down and-”

“Nope, not happening.”

“Why the hell not?”

“I followed,” he inhaled through his teeth and pinching the bridge of his nose, “a broadcast from someone into the Divide only a short time after I got myself up out of the grave. I lost a damn dear friend to me in that forsaken place. A radio signal is what led me to have my brain, spine, and heart picked out of my body by some loons up in a tower! It’s. Not. Happening.” With that, he snapped his Pip-Boy back onto his wrist. The weight of it on him was always a small comfort.

A thick silence fell.

“I’m sorry,” the other two responded simultaneously. Their eyes met for a moment before gazing back down at their own feet.

“…Don’t be,” Courier Six finally sighed. “I’m just… I’m really messed up from it, okay?”

“We understand,” Gannon replied for the both of them. “Do you still want to go to HELIOS One?”

“Yeah. Maybe we can help them get that… what did you say it was?”

“ARCHEMEDIES?” Veronica rose an eyebrow, opening the door to the outside. A blast of heat washed over them. “Are you saying…?”

“I’m not saying anything,” he bent down to disarm the mines. “From what I understand, we could use it as a power source for the Mojave. Could benefit a lot of folk.”

“I see.”

“Well, come on now,” he waved an arm, moving forward. “Wouldn’t want you nerds missing out.”

The tension was alleviated, and the trio left the awkwardness behind them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A few notes for this chapter: Veronica doesn’t play Caravan, and I know this, I just don’t care. I’ve also never played a single hand of Caravan in game so I hope it doesn’t look too stupid on paper.  
> In my canon, because Courier Six has not gone to the Sierra Madre yet it is not known to him that Elijah had been to the Divide (as Elijah only mentions it in dead money) or that Christine had known Ulysses. He makes the connection later on.  
> My canon presents the fact that Elijah had spoken of places like the Sierra Madre, insinuating that he’d heard of it before he actually did, which I am totally okay with.
> 
> This work is un-beta’d and crafted via copious visitations to the fallout wiki, youtube, and the dark depths of my memory.


	8. A Solis Ortu Usque ad Occasum

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Science! And annoyance! And thievery! And radscorpions...?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warning: sexually explicit content ahead (masturbation)  
> longerish chapter for the wait. i've been writing this for like six hours at the time of this line. i need to go to bed in an hour. whee

HELIOS One glimmered not too far in the distance, the sun dancing and reflecting off the solar panels. They sat, unable to pivot, making their job effectively useless. What the NCR needed was scientific knowledge to return the plant to operable conditions.

And one Courier had the luck to bring that scientific knowledge to the table.

Arcade and Veronica were excited to go see what HELIOS One held, though not so excited to deal with the NCR that guarded the place. 

"Before the NCR took it," Veronica explained on the way, "the Brotherhood of Steel made sure they put it into an almost inoperable state. They put into place some pre-war security systems, and then abandoned it during Operation: Sunburst."

"Doesn't seem like a Brotherhood-type thing to do," Aberdeen muttered.

"It wasn't. Father Elijah couldn't use ARCHIMEDES II, so he fled into the wastelands with no trace of him. At the time, we were completely surrounded by NCR and they had more troops than we were able to handle. So we had to retreat and hid away in Hidden Valley as a result."

"Should you really be talking about this around me?" Arcade Gannon of Follower persuasion piped up. 

"What are the Followers gonna do? Find the Brotherhood and offer assistance to them?" Then, in a sarcastic voice, Veronica added, "Oh no! Whatever will they do!" She smirked at the doctor. He snorted, and though he'd been wearing a helmet, one could tell he was returning the smile.

"This Elijah guy seemed like a real treat," Aberdeen cut back to the conversation at hand. Veronica's smile twisted into a frustrated frown, then contemplative, but she didn't respond. "Heads up, you two, and let me do the talking."

They had fast approached the power plant, and there were a few NCR soldiers standing at attention at the only entrance into the facility that didn't require climbing over barbed wire fences. 

"Hold it there," the lieutenant in charge called from about ten paces out. Aberdeen was familiar with recognizing their ranks by looks, and attitude, alone. She approached, hand wrapped around her back onto her rifle just in case. "This isn't some kind of public place where civilians can just come wandering into. State your business."

"Lieutenant, my name's Courier Six," he pulled his helmet off and offered a hand to shake. Just as he did anyone else. This trait, Gannon kept thinking to himself, was admirable. Aberdeen lowered his hand when the Lieutenant didn't reach out to shake. "I understand the hesitation. Surely you must know about me from your comrades up in McCarran, or any of the ranger stations I've been around to."

"I may have. What's your point?"

"I hear you are having some trouble getting the plant to operate with full functioning power. I'd like to help. Could bring a lot of good to the people of the Mojave." The lieutenant's arm lowered to her side, cautious glare softening to a more neutral expression.

"You're right, we are. I'm Lieutenant Haggerty. Sorry for my caution, it's just..." She eyed Veronica.

"Don't worry, she's won't cause any problems. You can trust me on that."

"You so much as look at someone the wrong way and you're out of here," Haggerty spoke directly to Veronica. The scribe opened her mouth to say something in response, but Arcade reached over and touched her shoulder. She looked to the ground and nodded silently. "Glad we understand each other. Alright Courier, I'll let you on in. We actually have some half-wit engineer inside by the name of Fantastic or some crap that you can talk to. He can get you caught up on everything. There's also a Follower scientist as his assistant, so to speak." Arcade's head popped up in attention to that. "Head on in, and remember, no trouble, you hear me?"

"No trouble to be made, lieutenant. Let's go." 

Haggerty nodded to one of her soldiers and they went and unlocked the main doors to the facility. The trio made their way inside. It was larger than it looked in there, or so it seemed, and the instant there was no one around:

"Just who does she think she is?!" Veronica seethed. "I can understand that attitude to someone who was wearing power armor, but me?! I'm just a scribe! That bitch, if she weren't so damn pretty I'd've power-punched her in the face!"

Aberdeen and Arcade turned to look at her, both in surprise. 

"What?" Her face was red, brows furrowed and teeth barred in anger.

"Nothing, I'm just glad you let this out here instead of where people could hear you," the courier laughed. "Didn't think you had that kind of anger in you, pipsqueak." 

"Pipsqueak?! Why I aught to-" She started to storm towards him, raising her arms, but the doctor stepped between them. 

"Guys, come on. Can we not?"

The girl huffed, shoulders tensed and fists at her hips. She looked like a child about to have a tantrum. 

"Sorry, sorry," Aberdeen quickly apologized. "I didn't mean offense, Veronica. I'll admit, you actually scared me a bit there. Let's go find this idiot in sunglasses, maybe if no one is watching you can punch him, alright?"

"Yeah," she agreed noncommittally. She would calm down in the next few minutes, feeling better just having getting her thoughts out of her system. She knew she was younger and shorter than the two boys she was with, hell, than most of the people she came in contact with, but she was no child. Being treated the way she was felt wrong, was wrong, but she wouldn't speak on it until later that night.

* * *

 

The three of them finally came upon a man wearing sunglasses and with horrible hair. This, they presumed, was Fantastic himself. 

"Fantastic, right?" Aberdeen went to introduce himself to him. Arcade glanced to his right to see a familiar face in the doorway leading into the next room.

"Ignacio? Ignacio Rivas?" The scientist perked up, eyeing over Arcade with a raised eyebrow.

"That's me... And you are?"

"Oh!" The goof had forgotten to take off his helmet. He did so and a look of familiarity washed over Ignacio. "Sorry about that."

"Gannon! Been a while, my friend, good to see you again." The two gave a short embrace. They hadn't known each other very well, in fact, and had only met in passing. Still, seeing a friendly face after a long period apart is better than never again. "What are you doing all the way outside of Freeside?"

"My companion is looking to get this place up and running again," he nodded over towards Aberdeen, who had glanced over with a look of 'dear God, help me this man is an idiot' and pleading on his face. Veronica was doing no such thing, simply leaning against the wall behind Fantastic, arms crossed and lips pursed like she was ready to kill the man. Arcade smirked and looked back towards Ignacio.

"Ah, that's some great news, actually. That guy's a total moron, and a chem addict to boot." His eyes slid to indicate a small pile of Mentats to the side. "I get one every now and again, but he eats them like candy. How good is your friend with tech?"

"Pretty good, I'd say. He managed to get us into the Strip just by rattling off some code to the Securitrons. He's also mentioned how he repaired an old eyebot. Guess that's not really much to go off of."

"Better than the alternative." 

At that moment, Aberdeen had finished his conversation and stepped over to the Followers. He clapped a hand on Arcade's shoulder, with a forced smile on his face. "Arcade! Buddy. Who's your friend?"

"This is Ignacio. He's the Follower the lieutenant mentioned earlier, and an old friend of mine."

" _Oh thank God,_ " he sighed with relief, bending over to put his hands on his knees, like he was exhausted. "Surely you have more sense than the fraud behind me?"

"I can hear you!" Fantastic scoffed.

"I don't care!"

"Pssht, I don't need this, I'm goin' out for a walk."

"Yeah, you better," Veronica side-eyed him. 

"What was that,  _woman_? Need I remind you of your  _place_ in this world?" Aberdeen's body popped back up, an ire in his eyes.

"'Scuse me one second," he smiled with a thousand furies. "Fantastic, buddy, sorry about that, let's go take a walk."

"This can't be good," Arcade muttered as the Courier and idiot left the room, Veronica in tow.

"No, someone needs to hit him with a clue-by-four," Ignacio finally spoke. "So about the plant. I have a password to one of the terminals outside that someone left laying around - I'll let you guys have it on one condition."

"Name it."

"If you get it up and working, you provide power to the whole region."

"I think that's actually what Aberdeen wants," he said with a grin. "That man's altruistic nature is profound and stunning. He's already given so much. Julie is probably incredibly happy with him right now."

"That's so wonderful to hear," Ignacio said joyfully. "With the world the way it is, we could use more men like him. Here," he took Arcade's hand and pressed a piece of paper into it, "this is the password. If you two need anything, and I mean anything, let me know."

Arcade thanked him and went looking for his companions. When he couldn't find them, he went out to the back of the plant and took a rest in some shade that had fallen against the building. It was too stuffy inside for him, anyway. 

* * *

"Arcade!" Aberdeen's voice shook him awake. "Hey, I was looking for you. You ready to get working on this?"

The doctor blinked a few times. He had fallen asleep standing up in the cool shade, funny enough. The man could sleep anywhere. "Hm? Yeah, sorry. Just kinda..."

"It's alright, we were gone for a while anyway," Veronica said. "Well, only about an hour." Her face was beaming, as if she had gotten a present.

"What did you two do," he questioned in an accusatory voice. 

"Let's just say Fantastic became a Fantastic meal for some radscorpions," Veronica chuckled. Arcade's tired eyes immediately widened into a glare at the two of them.

"He had it coming! That guy was profiting off being a liar to these guys, and he wouldn't have fixed the problems anyway.  _More_ people would have suffered if we let him be. Plus, I don't just let someone try to intimidate my friends like the way he did." 

"I got to punch him!" Veronica raised her arms in victory.

"To death," Aberdeen added.

"To death!" She grinned wider. 

"I'm... just gonna let it go," Gannon sighed. 

"You can be mad at me later," the courier leaned in and muttered to him with a wink. Arcade's face flushed red. He leaned back out and started towards a cage in the distance. Fantastic, for how useless he was, had told him about the cages containing the terminals to reset the mainframe connection and the traps that lay around them. Easy enough. 

"Aberdeen, Ignacio gave me a password for one of the terminals. He gave it to me on the condition that we'd make sure the power would go to the full region."

"Good thing I already had that in mind. The NCR won't like us too much for it, but they won't come after us. They can deal with it." The trio came to a halt as Aberdeen reached around and quickly pulled out his gun.

"What, what is it?"

"Radscorpions."

"What? In here?" He gestured to the two crawling right outside the tower. 

"Probably dug under the fences, or something."

"I got it!" Veronica shouted, running full speed at the pests. Two soldiers turned the corner by the tower at that very moment, jumping back and cussing at the sight of the radscorpions. They looked up only for a moment to see a young woman in scribe robes skidding in and using her momentum to  _punch_ the one in the back, sending it splattering up against the side of the tower. With a war cry, she jumped atop the other one and pummeled on it until its face caved in, squirting radscorpion guts outwards. In that moment, the four men stared at dusty, bug-gut covered Veronica with gaping mouths. She had a maniacal smile on her face, panting from the adrenaline. She finally looked up from her victory, smile fading from her face at the crowd. "What? What are you looking at?"

The two soldiers started to laugh and compliment her while the other two men looked to each other.

"Today's not going to be full of her punching things to death, will it?"

"I certainly hope not, but at least she didn't do it one of those poor fellows. Anyway, Arcade, since you have that password why don't you take Veronica over to that terminal and take care of it? I have the other password. He said it was for the northern terminal, so by deduction, yours must be for the southern."

"As long as she doesn't try to punch me."

* * *

She didn't try to punch him, but she  _did_ punch some guard dogs. From afar, they heard Aberdeen cussing up a storm as he disabled a few traps, but the mainframe connection reset went relatively easy from there.

Well, that is, until Aberdeen just kept swearing, and calling for Arcade. 

"Wonder what he got himself into this time," Veronica idly wondered. 

"I'll go check. Why don't you head over to the tower and wait for us?"

"And marvel at bug guts? No, thanks."

The doctor took his time walking over to the other cage, and deeply regretted doing so when he saw his companion prying a bear trap off his ankle.

"Jesus Christ, you gonna keep staring or what?!" 

"Oh, that's gross," Veronica turned away, face becoming a pale green color. Arcade quickly was able to help him get the bear trap off.

"How the hell did you manage to do this to yourself? Your ankle is completely crushed. There's no way you'll be able to walk on that."

"Less judgement, more help, please?" Aberdeen's entire left ankle had been devoured by the trap. It was actually pretty well hidden under a layer of dirt. To his credit, the rusted fangs of it looked like normal sharp rocks. 

Arcade always carried around a bag of basic medical supplies for things like this. He tore off his companion's boot and the cloth off that was at the end of his pant leg. Thankfully the armor hadn't been damaged. He took a bottle of purified water to first wash the punctures, then sterilized it with some alcohol. Aberdeen was already hissing from the pain but that made him almost roll over. The doctor urged him to stay still and uncapped a syringe. Aberdeen almost chastised him for using a stimpak, but to his relief it was Med-X. After a quick injection, Aberdeen's pathetic noises subsided into a sigh of relief. Arcade gently turned his ankle in his callused hands, observing the damaged. Yeah, his ankle was definitely broken. He took a roll of gauze and covered the puncture wounds, then wrapped his ankle in a tight bandage.

"Am I gonna live, doc?" Aberdeen said in a fake, rough voice, pretending to swoon.

"Shut up, you disaster of a human. You'll be fine. I want to get you inside before I finish you off."

"You're gonna kill me? Bout damn time."

"Can you, for ten whole seconds, be serious?"

"I can, but I won't." The courier flashed a shit-eating grin at his companion.

"Is it over yet?" Veronica called timidly.

"The girl can punch a man to death and several other wild animals, but this sight of this makes her queasy," Aberdeen shook his head in disbelief. "Yeah, it's over."

"Come on, Veronica, help me get him inside." The two lifted him up and acted as crutches, with onlookers shaking their heads at the absurdity. Aberdeen had a few choice words for them, like 'fuck off' and 'don't you have standing around to do?'

* * *

Ignacio led them to a bed. Normally, they'd have to go to the medical tent outside, but he considered this as part of his favor. He didn't know much about medicine, so he took Veronica to get some dinner and let Arcade get to work. There was only so much left he could really do, aside from stop himself from smacking the courier silly for his self-depreciating jokes and making light of his pain. Crushed bones couldn't exactly be reset.

"I really didn't want to ever have to use this," he muttered to himself. 

"Use what?"

Aberdeen was laying on a cot in the lab. He had, with the help of Arcade, been able to remove his armor from the waist down. Not without the obligatory flirtatious comment, of course, much to the humor of Ignacio and Veronica before they left. He had his neck turned to stare at Arcade, going through is bag, and he was twiddling his thumbs. There were obvious tan lines from where he frequently removed his armor to expose to the sun - around his neck, parts of his arms, and hands. He wore a plain shirt underneath everything, and long underwear that had been pushed up to accommodate for the procedure. His delicate brown skin was splotched with scars and dark freckles alike, and, Arcade noticed, he had just a dusting of thin hair on his arms and legs. Probably, though, from the constant rubbing of a full cover of clothing. His eyes gazed across his torso and a brief thought flickered across his mind of what he looked without it on, as Aberdeen had excused himself to undress the previous nights. He didn't dare look at his groin.

"This," he finally interrupted his thoughts, pulling out a bottle from his bag. 

"Hydra?" The courier's eyes widened. "You just carry that stuff around with you?"

"I only have the one. And I know you'll want to be up and about quickly, so..." He sat Aberdeen up, uncapping the Hydra and lifting it to his lips. 

"My arms aren't broken," he sneered playfully, wrapping his hand around the bottle that the doctor had not let go of.

"Sorry, I just wanted to make myself useful. Drink half now, and the other half later."

Time slowed for a second, their faces oddly close to each other, hands touching. Aberdeen's lips were slightly parted, taking a breath in. And the moment passed as he finally took the bottle completely and drank down the chemical concoction. Gannon had felt this sort of thing before. The attraction, the beating heart, sweaty palms being wiped on his jacket, clearing his throat and moving to close his bag. He was not unfamiliar with the longing to be with another man, especially one as attractive as Aberdeen. Scars aside, he found himself wishing that it was his lips on the courier's instead of the bottle stealing the kiss. He shook his head, what was this nonsense? He barely knew the man.

"I'll be joining the others for dinner. Want me to bring you anything?"

"No thanks," he set the bottle on the ground. "I'm not hungry for anything right now."

"Alright. Get some rest, and when we're done eating, we'll discuss come back to discuss what the plan is."

"Sounds good." He slid back down to lay flat on the cot, reaching over to grab a nearby book off a table. Arcade crossed the room and opened the door. He hesitated in the doorway for a moment.

"Will you be alright here on your own?"

"Yup." He idly flipped a page. He'd already read this one. Big Book of Science. Good refresher, though, he guessed.  Arcade exited and closed the door behind him. Aberdeen listened to the sounds of his footsteps walking away, and when he was sure he was alone, he put the book back. No one else would come into the lab, that he knew for sure. The rush of chems from the Hydra gave him a boost in energy.

Hesitantly, despite the promise of complete privacy, he slipped a hand under the band of his long johns. He palmed at his penis, soft, but he really wanted this. He hadn't had a good jerk since before he had wandered into Freeside in the hopes of finding a therapist. He hadn't been successful in his search for mental health care, but friends are nice to have, nonetheless. He put his mind off from all of that, though, and gripped around the base of his cock. His free hand wrestled his shirt upwards with the knowledge that if they saw the stain... well, they'd know what he was up to while they were having a bite to eat. A few fingers held onto his balls, massaging them oh so gently, imagining them being played with the tongue of a certain fair-skinned doctor. He sighed, no, panted out a breath, one of desperation, and his member hardened. His hand slipped up to the tip, easing the foreskin up and down, closing his eyes to the sensation. Slow, steady, squeezing and building up to a faster pace. After a minute of this, he hastily paused and slid his underwear down far enough to free his movements. With a few more hard pumps he was arching his back into it, biting his lip and grunting quietly. He pumped faster, hips simulating the movement of thrusts while using his good foot for leverage. 

"Arc," he murmured, hand squeezing around his dick harder. " _Fuck_ , I want you!" He furiously wanted to finger himself or grab something to plug his ass so he could roll over and hump the cot, but limited movement had him restrained. His mind kept imagining instead that it was Arcade's hand, roughly jerking him, making him plead, _please, please just fuck me already!_ Arcade would deny him this pleasure and edge him, lick him, suck and squeeze on his balls until he would finish on his face, dirtying his glasses. The fantasy alone was enough to make Aberdeen come, shuddering and moaning a bit louder than he would like to. Semen landed across his stomach, sinking into the patch of hair that had lined itself with sweat. He panted, stroking himself enough to get every drop out before he dropped his hips down with small, quick breaths exiting his lips.

And then, the realization that the Med-X had worn off and the Hydra was kicking in was enough for his eyes to pop open, instead of sliding into a nap. He looked about: there was a small hand towel on a table across the room. He swore, and pulling his undergarments back into place, he pushed himself off the bed and hopped on one leg to it, grabbing onto whatever he could for balance. In his bag he grabbed a purified water, making a mental note to get more, as there were only four bottles left, and he stumbled back over to the cot. He cleaned himself, sweating now more from the rapid pain of Hydra working its magic on his bones and muscles. Aberdeen pulled over Arcade's bag. He rummaged for a moment, finding the Med-X in a small inner pouch, and then made quick work of injecting it. He sighed relief; the feeling of sleep starting to wash over him. This was exhausting. 

* * *

 

"I still don't think you should be up and around on that," Arcade chastised the courier. "We can take care of it tomorrow. What's one more day?"

"You make it sound so easy," Aberdeen replied wearily. "I don't like sitting around and being useless."

"Happens to the best of us."

"Not to me."

"You'll have to wait until the sun is at its peak to align the mirrors anyway," chimed in Ignacio. "It's too late in the day for that." Aberdeen had managed to sleep through an entire meal, and though they had taken an early dinner, it was already past seven pm. "It'd be best for you to rest. Don't want the wasteland's savior breaking himself even more," he added with a chuckle. 

"Fine. Fine." Aberdeen shook his head, then in annoyance, pulled his dreads back and wrapped one around the rest to create a makeshift ponytail. Every little thing was setting him off, due to the low, aching pain in his foot. The smell of the lab, the brightness of the lights, the creaking of metal from within the plant. He hungered to be in Novac, where he could rest in silence and darkness, the only thing waking him being his nightmares. It wasn't even that far, and if it weren't for his foot, he'd be long gone into getting there. "But is there somewhere else I can go? I can't stand being in this room anymore. No offense."

"Yeah, I can arrange something for you. Give me about a half hour, we can get you three a private room. Well, as private as you can get around here."

"You're a saint, Ignacio." Arcade said this with sincerity.

"Think nothing of it. You're doing everyone a great amount of good."

Half an hour passed, with Veronica building a house of cards, Aberdeen staring annoyed at the wall, Arcade fretting about his companions wounds, and true to his word Ignacio granted them a small private office with two mattresses thrown in for good measure. One was wider than the other. Veronica meekly asked to use the smaller one, and the men agreed to it without hesitation. 

"Don't be making any weird noises in the night, okay?" She said with a wink. They both rolled their eyes despite their lust within. 

Aberdeen, setting up on one side of the larger mattress, promised he'd drink the rest of the Hydra tomorrow morning, in fear that the pain of the sped-up healing process would keep him up all night, and argued that there wasn't enough Med-X to keep him sedated and get them to their destination. Gannon, not wanting to fight about it, just said okay. Veronica, not feeling tired, simply set up her meager belongings onto the smaller mattress and said she was going for a walk for nostalgia's sake, even leaving her power fist behind. Aberdeen started readying himself for bed, and the doctor simply removed his armor, finally, and set it aside. He'd left Aberdeen's in the lab, knowing it to be safe there for the night. From within the endless depths of the courier's pack, per his request, Arcade pulled out his set of a less-than-clean shirt and lounge pants for sleeping. 

"There's another in there if you'd like to not sleep in the same clothes again," he mentioned. "Might be a bit small on you, though."

The sleepwear was pre-war, probably something Aberdeen had found in an abandoned house somewhere. Not entirely untrue, as he'd pulled them out of drawers in the former homes of the scientists in Higgs Village. Long abandoned, save for an incredibly tiny deathclaw that sent the courier running. It had softened from age and smelled musty, but Gannon wasn't going to argue against fresh pajamas. He had already pulled off his undershirt when Aberdeen made a small 'um' noise. He turned to look to see him struggling to get the trousers on.

"Want some help, or...?"

"No, just-" He paused momentarily, staring at the shirtless doctor. The feeling of his eyes on his chest made Arcade feel suddenly very self aware. He wasn't fit by any means, he could keep up for the most part, but he didn't have a six-pack or anything. Aberdeen quickly closed his mouth and blinked, appearing to swallow a lump in his throat. "Just, uh," he continued dryly, "trying to figure out the logistics of this."

"One leg at a time."

"I know that, you pedantic asshole," he scoffed. He could at least bend his knee and lift his foot, even if it hurt to slide the pants on. After a moment of struggling because he couldn't do it standing up, he tossed the trousers aside. "Fuck it, I'll just sleep in my underwear." He pouted. Arcade snickered. "What?"

"I can help, you know."

"You've helped enough."

"Did I do something to make you mad at me?"

"No."

"Then what's with the attitude?"

"I'm overstimulated! There's too much going on, too many chems in my system. I feel about as mixed up as a cocktail."

"Is there anything I can do to help?" He asked quietly, hoping that it wouldn't irritate him.

"No, I mean, I don't think... No, no. Just get dressed or else you'll distract me too much." Arcade wanted to say something, wanted to keep distracting him, but he felt that it'd be too much, too soon, and this wasn't the right place. So he did as he was asked and even put Aberdeen's Pip-Boy up on the lone table in the corner of the room, organized their belongings, and fell asleep without much more discussion.

* * *

Veronica came back a few hours later, having taken her time reminiscing about the plant. She found her companions fast asleep, curled facing each other. Her heart soared and she wanted to gush audibly about how cute it looked, but she bit her tongue to let them sleep.

And then she noticed the dim light of the Pip-Boy on the table. Curiosity struck her. Carefully stepping over the snoring corpses, she memorized the position of the Pip-Boy before nabbing it off the table. She exited the room and hid herself in a dark corner, fiddling with the radio and map. She  _had_ to find the source of that signal. She had to find out where Father Elijah went, and if she could follow just a trace of it... Within the hour, she had basically reconstructed the map on the Pip-Boy. Come the time they stepped outside of HELIOS One, Aberdeen would be following a map marker that sent him east, towards the river, thinking he was going south towards Cottonwood Cove. So she hoped. It was selfish, and she felt bad, but it was a necessary evil. Because when she saw Elijah again, she would deliver a fist to his face.

* * *

"That aught to do it," said Aberdeen, flipping the switch. He began his decent back down the tower, the blinding rays of the sun flashing into his eyes just before he entered the inner workings of it. His foot had done a great deal of healing overnight, and while he was walking with a limp, he could tough it out. Arcade had insisted on issuing him a stimpak after breakfast that morning, to which Aberdeen caved because he just wanted to get it over with. He walked through the facility to the lab to pick up his armor, where Ignacio thanked him with a few extra medical supplies, and went to meet his party at the front of the plant. "We ready to get going, you two?"

"Only if you are."

"Alright. Next stop, Novac, then onto Cottonwood Cove."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> some notes: what the fuck else am i supposed to call that room that Fantastic and Ignacio are in??? it looks like a lab might as fuckin well be a lab. hooray changing canon for my own selfish needs


	9. Invidia

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> To Novac, then to Cottonwood...?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> good morning this took me nine hours to write  
> semi-sexually explicit content ahead

There were no signs for Novac, and no signs needed on the road: Courier Six knew the way by heart. This, Veronica thought, was okay, one detour won't hurt. The courier didn't look at his Pip-Boy at all since putting it on that morning.

Did Veronica feel awful about doing something that was, at best, morally gray? Yes, yes she did. She didn't say hardly a word on their expedition to the motel that wasn't too far away in the newly brandished afternoon. She kept nervously glancing at the courier, eyes darting between his wrist and head, then at the ground, or straight ahead. Her eyes were playing table tennis between the two players of 'trying to act normal' and 'anxiety'. Short of a not entirely unexpected pair of feral ghouls, he didn't lift the arm. He didn't want to, quite honestly. He kept his hand pushed against his injured leg. It was healed; he could walk. Still there was a pain, almost like a rock in his shoe, every time he stepped. Doable. Annoying. He complained about it to Arcade, who lovingly told him to suck it up and if it still hurt that night he'd take a look at it.

The radio didn't play that trip. It was broken, it seemed. Even the usual chime of the hour was strangely muted. "Seems like the speaker's out. I can fix it later in Novac," said its owner. "I got all the parts in my room. Have either of you seen Dinky yet?"

Veronica had, Arcade hadn't, and wondered aloud, "What the hell is a Dinky?"

"Good thing we're seeing her in the day, then," he said with a wink. "You try not getting freaked out at seeing a dinosaur on the horizon. You'd think it was the end of the world all over again."

For a man who was so good at sneaking around, he could talk a mile in your shoes. He filled the silence of the broken radio with his words, prying information out of his companions, telling little strings of stories he imagined related to what they said. Usually, they didn't, but he was being polite, trying to imagine what they had been through, while pretending he hadn't been through enough for ten lifetimes. 

Arcade wanted to ask him about the Divide. Aberdeen had mentioned it in following a strange radio signal. "A whole different story to tell." He was far more open to talking about the Big Empty, because despite what happened to him, he almost seemed like he had... fun going there. What _Aberdeen finds fun_ , thought the doctor, _seems like a garish nightmare to me._ Safety suits that carried on fighting even when the human inside was long dead, even  _talking_ and saying creepy things like "Hey, who turned out the lights?" Arcade shuddered at the idea. Things like having your body parts removed to be replaced by robotic parts, discovering the origin of cazadores, brain dead lobotomites hunting you until their last breath, constant threat under a crazed scientist - they all sounded like one would come back irreparably changed from something like that. And the deathclaw! So that was the wee thing that brought upon the scar across his face. He said it was no taller than the average dog, but it gave him a run for his money. He had knelt down to get a closer look and - thwap! He laughed it off, feeling embarrassed about the whole situation. Made him head right the hell out of Higgs Village. And this was the same man who was sniping deathclaws twice his own height from ruined buildings in the Divide.

It didn't take long for the three to see a figure rising in the shimmering distance. 

"You weren't kidding," chuckled Arcade. "What a sight."

"You bet!" He had a bit more of a pep in his step now. Novac became his first real home since waking up. Goodsprings was... nice... but the monotony of it would've bored the poor courier out of his mind. Primm was too depressing for him. Novac? Good amount of Legion to kill off, the baddest snipers this side of the Mojave, plentiful with traders. Gets its share of drama, too, after the mishap of poor Boone and his wife. Veronica was staring to the east despite what laid ahead of her. She knew the signal came from that direction. She searched long and hard in her memory for what was out there that she felt was so familiar. That is, until, she finally looked up and saw her companions far ahead of her.

"H-hey! Wait up!"

* * *

"Is that Courier Six I see, or are my eyes playin' tricks on me again?" A voice boomed down from the mouth of the dinosaur. Rightfully made two-thirds of the party jump in surprise. "And he brings friends!"

"Manny, you handsome devil, how the hell are you?"

"Don't flatter me. I'll meet you downstairs!"

"Who is that?"

"Manny Vargas. One of the two first recon snipers living out this way."

"NCR?!" Veronica groaned. "More of them, really?"

"Ahh, don't worry, they don't report to anyone. Ain't in the NCR no more - but you know how good their aim is by that title, though."

Aberdeen headed around the fence, leading his companions, to the base of the dinosaur where there was a set of steps leading to a door. The inside of the dinosaur is hollow, of course it is. Standing outside, though, was a Hispanic man, clad in armor and wearing a bright red recon cap. Aberdeen removed his helmet upon approaching Manny, reaching the man with arms open. Clearly, they were familiar with one another due to the nature of their embrace: Aberdeen's arms around Manny's shoulders, Manny's around the courier's waist. There were muttered 'missed you's and Aberdeen pressed his cheek to the Khan's to whisper something the other two couldn't hear. Arcade felt a weight in his stomach, and an awful thought occurred to him: they had been together at one point or another. He shifted uncomfortably as they held each other for what felt like hours. Veronica kicked him; she could sense that he was being a doofus.

"Who are your friends here, Abby?"

_Abby?_

"This is Veronica, better known as the magnificent fist."

"I am?"

"And this is Arcade. Hey, don't be rude, Arcade, show that pretty face of yours to my friend here." Arcade slipped his helmet off.

"Charmed," he muttered.

"Oyyy, I got somethin' to be jealous of, eh?" Manny elbowed Aberdeen. "Well it's been good seeing you, I can't stay long, got duties to attend to." He nodded up to the dinosaur. "Nice meeting you two. Maybe later we can all have a drink, or something? When I'm off my shift."

"I'd like that," Aberdeen replied for the group. "Get some Legion fuckers for me, alright?"

"You got it."

Manny disappeared up the steps, and the courier turned back to the group. 

"My room's upstairs. Something wrong, Arcade? You look really pissed off."

"Hm? No, just zoning out a bit. It's pretty hot today."

"No hotter than any other day."

"Mm."

He led them up the steps, to the first room, unlocking the door and letting them in first. "Welcome to chez moi." Neither Veronica nor Arcade knew what that meant. They didn't say anything, though. For a little motel room, Aberdeen had fixed it right up to  make it proper. Bed pushed to a corner to make room for more floor space, bookshelves dusted off and organized with pre-war books, instruction manuals, magazines, and even a comic book. Gun cabinet in a corner. A dresser and drawer pushed together against the wall next to the door, medical supplies spread atop those. Even a small makeshift desk made with a patio table and chair. "We have running water here, but it'll be the same temperature as the water tank. Go on ahead and take a shower if you like." Before he had even finished, Veronica was already shutting the bathroom door. The men hummed a snicker at her. Packs hefted atop the bed, boots came off, duster jackets and armor removed, sighs of content to be inside and away from the boiling hot wastes. Even a fan was running, a rare sight to see. It pulled the hot air of the motel room outside.

"Not too shabby," Arcade commented. 

"Gotta make home livable." Aberdeen shrugged, pulling some cleaner pre-war outfits out from the dresser. "Take what you like, I'm gonna get comfy and get working on my Pip-Boy. Feel free to read, take some caps and go to the traders just outside the fence, do whatever." He ended the sentence in a mutter, pulling his Pip-Boy off to stare at intently.

"I actually know someone who lives here. Think I might give her a visit." Arcade was dressing himself in his old, familiar lab coat and scrubs. The comfort of having the one set of clothing he'd been toting around with him on his body felt nice. 

"Alright."

They said no more and Gannon left the motel room in silence. He slowly paced down the walkway to the room on the far end of the motel: Daisy's. He wondered what he would say to her after all these years apart. He knocked on the door and waited.

* * *

Veronica

She sighed, brushing the water off her skin and drying off best she could with the towel that was there. She hadn't taken a shower in who knows how long. It was a blessing to feel running water, even if it nearly scalded her skin off. There was a knock on the door.

"Veronica? I have something for you."

"Can it wait? I haven't even gotten dressed yet."

"It's clean clothes, you dolt."

"Oh!" She pulled the door open enough for Aberdeen to stick a hand in, holding a bunch of folded cloth. She took it, neither of them daring to look out. Veronica unfolded the thin sheet to reveal something that made her gasp. A dress.  _A dress!_ It wasn't anything fancy. It was faded baby blue with white lace, as a permanent layer of dust had settled into it, and there was a brownish stain on the bottom hem. Still, it was a dress! She jumped up and down, hugging the article with a silent squeal. Without a second of hesitation she threw it on and wiped the fog from the mirror. She would turn this way and that; pose her arms; smile for an imaginary camera. She  _loved_ it. And yet, she felt guilty wearing it. A gift like this was unbecoming of someone who was deceiving someone like Aberdeen. But she couldn't just take it off, either. It would dispel the illusion that everything was okay. Plus, she really thought it brought out her eyes. She stepped out of the bathroom.

"Took your time in the-"

"Thank you."

"Hm?" Aberdeen glanced up from his Pip-Boy, screwdriver in hand. "What for?"

"The dress. Well, the shower, too, and everything else, but mostly the dress. I've always wanted one." She grinned and twirled around. "It feels so good to have one."

"Ah, I... totally knew that about you," he said, you know, like a liar. "And I finally get to see your hair." It was long, longer than he'd've imagined, reaching the middle of her back. Dark brown, flattened by the water, and when dry it would be perfectly straight. She awkwardly touched it self-consciously. "I'm gonna be spending most of my time today fixing this thing and relaxing, at least till supper time."

"What is there to do around here? I think I might get bored of just sitting around indoors all day."

"Hmm, well... You could go out to the traders, like I suggested to Gannon, or to the brahmin farms. Folk here are pretty friendly, so I think that as a scribe you'll hear lots of interesting stories."

"...Can I borrow some caps to trade with?"

"You got it." 

Aberdeen gave Victoria a surprising 500 caps. Where was he getting it from?! She set out downhill to the trader post and spent her day chatting with the locals, finding No-Bark to be particularly interesting and enjoying a silly make-believe story that a child told her using the plastic dinosaur souvenirs as props. For the time, she forgot that she didn't deserve this kindness when she was unwittingly leading Courier Six into a trap.

* * *

Arcade

"So that's what you've been up to this last decade," Daisy giggled. "And that Courier Six is the one who led you back into my presence! Oh, it's so nice to be with you again, my dear." Daisy Whitman was the only woman in Arcade's life after his mother had died. Someone who was once the fun aunt who would talk about piloting and teach him about how aircraft worked was now more of a motherly figure to him, with all the wonderful parts of her in tact. 

"I honestly never saw myself coming here. Freeside always kept me busy, after all. But Courier gave me something to be useful for." He smiled gently. 

"From what I hear on the radio, he's been helpin' lotta folk out. I knew he'd helped us out here in Novac, thanks to ol' Manny doublin' as the town crier." He winced at the name. "What's'a matter, darlin'?"

"This might sound silly, but... how much do you know about Manny? Six and he seem to be on very friendly terms."

"Do I sense some jealousy in that ol' noggin o' yers, Arcade?" 

"N-no!" He stammered, face flushing red. Daisy slapped her knee with a howl of laughter. 

"Aw, darlin', ain't nothin' to be ashamed of! A healthy dose of jealousy keeps ye on yer toes!"

"I'm  _not_ jealous, Daisy."

"I'd be jealous 'f I were you, too. They thought they was sneaky, but that Courier spent a week and then some 'round these parts, just for  _him_. Courier Six'd gone off to fix the problem o'er at REPCONN, with them ghouls," a story she had told him about earlier when Arcade had asked how Aberdeen had secured a home here, "and after that he went an' helped Boone solve the mystery of his wife's disappearance, and then he couldda just  _left_ , but he didn't." She shook her head, not in disapproval, but in humor. "He'd be spendin' all day up in that dinosaur with Manny, and when he thought everyone'd gone to bed, he'd go 'cross to Manny's bungalow and spend all night with 'im, too. Sometimes I wonder if he'd brought Manny with 'im, if Manny weren't protectin' us."

"Lovers make poor confidants," Arcade replied with a bitter undertone. "Wonder how long he'll stay this time."

"Depends on how urgent this business he got with Caesar is, I'd say."

"Not very."

"Buckle up, partner. Ye might be 'ere a while."

* * *

That evening came and as the sun set, Manny exited Dinky's interior in excitement. He couldn't wait for some time again with Aberdeen. Abby. He quickly changed and grabbed a few bottles of wine, knowing they'd have company for the first bit of the evening, and headed to have a drink with the trio. Arcade found he didn't mind Manny's presence so much, but he credited that to the amount of alcohol he kept drowning particular thoughts in. Veronica and Manny had an arm wrestling contest for caps. Veronica won, to no one's surprise. Aberdeen caught Manny up on what had happened. Seemed he'd been gone for a number of weeks, but the sniper was relieved to hear that Abby had taken his revenge. The four of them ate some brahmin steak, the first real meal they'd had in a few days, enjoyed some liquor, and soon it came time for drowsiness to set in. 

Veronica passed out on the floor, so Arcade and Aberdeen pushed her gently onto two stacked bedrolls. It had been determined that the doctor and courier would share the bed, even if it barely fit the two of them. Manny wished them a good night, and quietly made his way back to his bungalow, anticipating Abby's arrival in it not too long after. Courier Six waited until he thought Arcade was properly asleep - slow breathing, no movement, eyes shut in drunken relaxation. He'd been smart enough to take the edge side and slipped silently out of bed and out the motel room.

Arcade wasn't that stupid. He threw the sheet off and waited until he heard his companion's footsteps descend the metal staircase and the sound of gravel crunching under shoes before he cracked the door open. He watched Aberdeen's silhouette disappear into one of the bungalows, then he crept down slowly, keeping as quiet as possible. Just outside the bungalow, he could hear the low murmuring of the two men inside. Why was he doing this to himself? He shook himself, pressing a careful ear to the door.

There was a bit of silence, with what sounded like shuffling. He didn't dare look up through a crack in the bungalow's siding. A hushed giggle and the words ' _stop that'_ were uttered, followed by a less than genuine apology. He felt anger rising in him. 

"I missed you, Abby," came Manny's voice. "I missed this, too." What sounded like a gasp. 

"Manny, please." He wasn't sure if that was pleading for more, or to stop.

"Please what?" More shuffling, and a distinct moan. Creaking of a bed. Arcade slumped against the door. "Gotta tell me what you want, babe. Or is your head too focused on that pretty boy doctor of yours?"

"Manny, I-"

"I don't care about him. You can do what you like when you're with him, but right now? You're with me. You came down to see me."

_This took a weird turn._

"I came down to talk to you, that's why I said earlier-" He was cut off again by something, a long,  _"ohhhhhh, ffffffuuuuuuck,"_ moan in his voice. "You're too fuckin good at tha- ah- ahh-" 

Muffled moaning, creaking, shuffling. Heavy breathing and the groans of names, curses. Growing into muted shouts of pleasure, lasting a solid thirty minutes. Arcade? Felt devastated. He shouldn't. The disappointment was not new. He could tell by the continued sounds of movement that they were not finished, so he stumbled back to the room in a daze, falling asleep without even remembering to take his shoes off.

* * *

"So, where did you go last night?"

"Mm?"

"Your shoes. You didn't have them on when we went to bed last night. Where'd you get up to go in the middle of the night?" Abby lit a cigarette. Both the men were hungover, but not nearly as Veronica. She was a total lightweight, so the two had stepped out to give her some privacy. It was late in the morning the next day, but thanks to some cloud cover, it wasn't already 110°.

"Needed to relieve myself," he lied, bending over the railway. 

"Yeah? You sure you didn't follow me?"

"How did you-"

"I didn't. But you just confirmed it for me." He took a long inhale, thoughtful look on his face. "What, are you jealous? Is that it?"

"Jealousy isn't the word I'd use for it," he lied again. "Worried is more like it. I don't know these people, Aberdeen."

"And you don't trust me?" He raised an eyebrow. "I live here. Anyone who was a threat was taken care of." He puffed on the cigarette again. "You don't need to lie to me, Arc." The doctor couldn't think of anything to respond with. It seemed that his mind was burdened with every possible thought and simultaneously nothing at all. A white noise. "Look at me, Arcade."

The courier had put out his cigarette and was facing Gannon. When he turned to look at the other man, Abby put a gentle hand on his face and lifted his chin up, pulling himself closer. Arcade's breath halted. A similar feeling of that when he was grabbed so fiercely by Aberdeen after speaking ill of ED-E passed through his gut. 

"What are you doing?" He croaked out.

Whatever would have passed through his lips next was silenced. He didn't even realize it until a second had passed; Aberdeen had kissed the doctor. The scent of burnt tobacco overwhelmed his senses. Abby's lips were cracked, dry against Arcade's moist ones. Arcade breathed it in, leaning into the kiss, but another second later, the spell was broken. His eyes fluttered open to find a stone-faced Aberdeen.

"What... did you do that for?"

"To reassure you."

"Of what, exactly?" He tore his face from the palm of the courier. 

"That," he sighed, "I don't know, that Manny isn't anything to me."

"Sure doesn't seem like he isn't!"

"Arcade, please."

He said that in the same tone of voice as he did to Manny last night.  _"Manny, please._ _"_  

"How can you say that?"

"Because I went down there to tell him that I... you know, and I've been so  _lonely_ and in need of companionship that I thought it might make me  _feel_ something-"

"So you just have meaningless sex with him?" Arcade found himself raising his voice. Aberdeen stepped back. "That's not a great way to help fix whatever inside you is broken."

"I know," he said quietly. "I know. Nothing ever could." The red cleared from Arcade's eyes and he saw a hurt man in front of him. 

"...Aberdeen, I didn't-" He hadn't meant to say it like that. 

"You know, I thought I didn't have a chance with you. Guess that doesn't excuse my actions, but now? I know I don't. Thank you, Arc, for letting me know." Aberdeen, despite feeling dashed, was surprisingly calm. Arcade was standing straight now, fists at his side. He didn't know what to do. He raised his fists, letting them open out, staring at his palms. He didn't know what to do. Aberdeen was turning back towards the door of the room, his room. He didn't know what to do. He reached for the knob. 

He didn't know what to do.

"Go back to Freeside, doc," Aberdeen said quietly, opening the door and leaving Arcade behind. 

* * *

It was almost a week later when a young woman in brown robes came barreling through the square of the Old Mormon Fort.

"Arcade! Arcade," she cried the blonde-haired doctor's name over and over. He glanced out of his tent to see Veronica running. "Arcade!" Tears were running down her face. He hastily stood, the girl crashing into his arms. He stumbled backwards but managed to keep hold of her, patting her back and letting her sob into him.

"Arcade, God, I didn't mean to, I just-"

"Hold on, Veronica, what's going on?" 

"It's Aberdeen," she managed to cough out. He stiffened. "He's disappeared and it's all my fault!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yes i changed her hair length sue me


	10. Begin Again

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We'll be waiting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> chapter ten milestone! I bought chinese food to celebrate.

"Start over."

Veronica took a deep breath, wiping the tears from her face. She explained:

After Aberdeen had dismissed Arcade, he had told her that they would be escorting him back to Freeside as a means of security. She didn't particularly enjoy having to backtrack; why would anyone? But after dropping him off, the two of them made their way south again, following the marker on Aberdeen's Pip-Boy. They couldn't listen to the radio. He had fixed it, but it only played that annoying Sierra Madre advertisement. As they approached their location, Aberdeen became suspicious of something. Where are all the Legionaries? He would be seeing more if they were close to Cottonwood Cove. Veronica said she didn't know, but that was a lie.

"What do you mean, that was a lie?"

"I... I messed with his Pip-Boy."

"What?" Arcade was taken aback. "Why?"

"I needed to find Father Elijah!"

"You..." He pinched the bridge of his nose in fury. "Okay, I'll save getting angry at you for when your'e done. Continue."

They found an abandoned Brotherhood of Steel bunker. It was nighttime, and it was as good a place as any to crash for the night. Her and Abby were greeted in the bunker by handwriting on the walls that pointed to the entrance, saying: "Sierra Madre." Even a strange bottle containing an orange liquid, which Veronica produced to show the doctor, was found outside the door. Despite the signs, they entered, mainly out of Aberdeen's frustration at the situation. He thought his Pip-Boy was acting up and leading him to the signal, with no clue as to who actually made it that way. He thought that by going inside he could clear the marker, get some rest, and then leave. But. The radio.

Down the hall, standing on a lone table and illuminated by a single light bulb was a radio. It sang:

_"Has your life taken a turn? Do troubles beset you? Has fortune left you behind? If so, the Sierra Madre Casino, in all its glory, is inviting you to begin again. Come to a place where wealth, excitement and intrigue await around every corner. Stroll along the winding streets of our beautiful resort, make new friends, or rekindle old flames. Let your eyes take in the luxurious expanse of the open desert under clear star-lit skies. Gaze straight on into the sunset from our villa rooftops. Countless diversions await: Gamble in our casino, take in the theater, or stay in one of our exclusive executive suites that will shelter you and cater to your every whim. So if life's worries have weighed you down, if you need an escape from your troubles, or if you just need an opportunity to begin again, join us, let go, and leave the world behind at the Sierra Madre grand opening this October... We'll be waiting."_

He marched down to the radio with intentions to turn it off, she said. There was a loud bang, as he crossed the threshold, she said. A gas filled the bunker, and that - and watching Aberdeen collapse onto the floor in a writhing fit - is the last thing she remembers before waking up some time later with a headache. When she came to, she said, she was on a cot in the bunker, but there were no signs of the courier. He had disappeared without a trace. She searched the bunker, only finding his weapon and armor. She left them there, thinking it was the safest place, and ran to the only place, the only person, she could think of to go to. To this end, she started to cry again, repeating, "it's all my fault I shouldn't have done that it's all my fault!"

Arcade was stunned beyond words. His mind raced a million miles a minute. Kidnapped. Illustrious Courier Six had been kidnapped. He couldn't find it in him to be mad at Veronica, despite her hand in the events. He fell onto his chair, head in his hands. There was a long silence, only interrupted by Veronica's sniffling and the noise from outside the tent. 

"Arcade," she finally said, "what are we going to do?" His head slowly lifted up.

"We're going to go look for him."

* * *

 

The first thing Aberdeen felt when he stirred awake was pressure. His head throbbed, his, well, his everything throbbed, actually, and there was a tightness around his neck. He struggled to take that first morning breath in and open his eyes. The sky above him was not that of a blazing, endless white but instead blood-red, as if dyed by the countless lives of those lost in the War. The sun... where was the sun? The clouds choked out the sight of it, yet he could tell it was daytime. Struggling, the courier sat up, feeling dizzy and misplaced. He blinked, taking in his surroundings. A plaza, it seemed, with art deco inspired architecture surrounding a fountain in a square. Partially hidden by the clouds was a building in the distance, looming like a haunting ghost. Before he could fully absorb the area he was in, a hologram flickered to life in front of him. It projected above the fountain, showing the face of a bitter looking old man.

"Are you listening?" His voice was rough. Aberdeen blinked, heart racing. "Are. You. Listening?!" He nodded. "Good. From now on, when I talk - listen. And follow my instructions. Play stupid, play clever, make the mistake of saying 'no'? That collar around your neck'll go off and take your head with it." Collar? Abby reached up and gently touched, a panic washing through him. An explosive collar. This wasn't the first time, and he recognized the feeling. Brotherhood of Steel tech. He wanted to vomit. 

"What do you want?" Aberdeen's voice cracked. His throat was dry. He realized right then that he was starving, and extremely dehydrated. It must have been several days since... since the bunker. His fear was overcome by rage. Veronica. The signal. Father Elijah. It became all too clear to him how suspicious she had been acting upon approaching the bunker.

"That structure you see above the fountain - the Sierra Madre casino... You need to break inside. A... heist. Too many years in the making. But to get inside, to avoid its traps... you'll need to gather the team. As I've found, one cannot do it alone."

He wasn't alone. He wasn't alone! Oh, God, he wasn't alone. Others had been lured into this. Trapped by this. "So I'll need others to pull off this... heist. Where are they?"

"Around the villa are three other collars like yours," Elijah's voice sounded pleased. "Collar 8, 12, and 14. Find all three and get them here, to the fountain. Then, we'll talk more. And should you get any ideas about killing each other and taking the treasure of the Sierra Madre for yourself - a warning. All of your collars are linked... one of you dies, you all die. If that's what it takes to make you cooperate, so be it." Aberdeen swallowed a dry lump at those words. He'd had lucky brushes with death so far, but this... was insane. What the hell kind of person does this?

"Why would... why would you  _do_ that?!"

"Because in some respects, breaking in to the Sierra Madre is easier than breaking human instinct. Greed. The Villa is filled with corpses. Some killed by the dangers here, some by me. Others... turned on each other. Once they realized the Sierra Madre could be theirs, they cared nothing for their freedom... their survival... or each other."

"Are.. they all dead?"

"The ones brought here live on only in what they've left behind, their marks - grafitti on the walls. And victims they've killed. Some tried to help... left supplies and healing for others who came. Their reward? They were tracked down, killed by others with baser instincts. Some of these murderers went as far as to leave traps behind them... turning markers for help into deathtraps for anyone following them. It killed some of them when they forgot where the traps lay... or when they desperately needed the assistance they had cut others off from."

"Oh, God... How many of these 'victims' did you bring here?"

"Too many." Aberdeen's heart dropped. "This place is dangerous... and its quarantine measures, its hazards... have claimed many. Failures upon failures. Do you think I wanted to place collars on you to ensure compliance? No... if robots could have done this, I would've sent them. The Sierra Madre is a complicated lock. Cracking it open requires human hands."

Aberdeen took a deep breath, taking in his surroundings again. He realized: "Hey - wait, where's my gear?"

"The Sierra Madre has many... defenses, means of screening guests for illicit or dangerous items. Your arrival here, weaponless, was not my intention. The Casino, this Villa... it takes anything with even a trace of radioactivity, traces of unknown substances... and returns it home. The bunker."

"What."

"The process is automated, and the casino itself has other, similar, 'services.' I was unable to find a workaround, except to send others in as tools. Still... I have not left you defenseless, and the Sierra Madre's security, in some respects, can help you if you are resourceful enough."

His armor. His LAER. The stockpile of ammunition he had. Back in that bunker he went into? Veronica. "Veronica! Veronica, is - is she okay?"

"Veronica?" Elijah paused quizzically. "You know my protege?"

"She told me a lot about you. Answer me, is she okay?"

"Well, she's certainly not here. I can assure you that she's still in the Mojave, probably even still in the bunker." 

Aberdeen sighed in relief. "That's... good, then. What do you mean by resourceful?"

"This place is well-preserved. Few who came here ever returned. All the treasures of the Old world lie scattered about, virtually untouched. Search, hunt... craft what you can from what you find. The trash of the Pre-War era can keep you alive - food, knives, more. Use them. Even the Villa's toxins... and the residue it leaves behind... can be shaped into tools and weapons. Gather it as well. Also... there is one more thing in your position, a rifle that will keep you alive, as surely as the collar will." 

It wasn't really on his person, but laying next to him. A rifle, indeed, unlike any other he'd seen before. He picked it up, turning it around in his hands. "What is this?"

"A holorifle, a weapon I constructed when I arrived... I have since made superior models - and modifications."

"Like the LAER."

"You-" Elijah sputtered, "you've been to the Big Empty! You know of my weaponry... I'd say it was impossible, but we both know nothing is impossible. For now, that tool will have to do until you find other weapons... and I suggest you do, the Holorifle's ammo is limited. Still, it should serve well enough. I fashioned it from the Holograms of the Villa and used it against the Villa's... living inhabitants."

"I'm.. I'm sorry, repeat that? There's people alive here?"

"Yes... the inhabitants..." He avoided calling them people. "Avoid them if you can, they are difficult to kill. Whatever has created them, bullets, explosions, energy... it can make them inert for a time, then they seem to crawl back up, restored. Perhaps it's the cloud. Perhaps something in their physiology."

"The cloud... That's what's surrounding me, right?"

"Yes. The copper and sulfur... burns the lungs and seeps into the skin. As for its origins... I am not certain. Pre-War industrial pollutants... something in the Sierra Madre structure... It is unique across the wasteland... and deadly. It has kept this place preserved since the Great War."

"Will exposure kill me?"

"No, while it will erode your health, it will only bring you to the point of death, no farther. At that point... Well, the air here is only lethal if you enter concentrated pockets of the Cloud. Too long inside one, you'll die, so be careful where you step. Rebreathers, chemical suits... there is no protection against it, it decays all it touches. I've found fighting against it useless."

"In that case, then, I'm guessing the only safe spaces to rest would be inside, or underground, wherever the cloud hasn't been exposed to."

"You would be correct."

"Can you tell me about the holograms you mentioned?" This sort of thing, asking a lot of questions, was routine, habit, for the courier. He needed all the information he could get.

"Ghosts," said Elijah. 

"Ghosts." Was there nothing the wasteland didn't have in it?

"They fill the Villa. More in the casino... much more. They carry out the functions the dead once did. They cannot be harmed; they only perform the same rote tasks until their power dies. THey are of no consequence - except for the security holograms, the ones with the silhouettes of the armored Sierra Madre guards."

"Ghosts. Armored ghosts." He sighed. "Why?"

"Most holograms perform specific functions. The security holograms, ever since the bombs fell, now perform their function. They will kill anyone they detect. They are immune to guns, weapons, EMPs... even energy weapons." Well, shit. "Still, they have their limitations. Their design limits their field of view, enough to avoid detection. Each has an emitter - destroy or disable it, and they cease to be a threat. Still, they still work as intended. Other technology here is more of a threat to you. Notably the Villa's radios and speakers."

"Oh, joy," he said dryly.

"Yes, music was intended to be broadcast all over the Villa. Over time, however, the radio signal has decayed and emits a different frequency. Speakers and radios interfere with the bomb collar frequency, and can trigger the detonators... prematurely."

"Greaaaaaaaat."

"It was an unfortunate side effect, one I did not anticipate. I was unable to calibrate the collars to block the signals, so you'll have to make do. You'll hear a beep from your collar if you get near one... Shielded ones, you can't destroy. You'll need to switch those ones off some other way."

"What kind of place even has such... insanity?" 

"Unfamiliar with the legend of the Sierra Madre? The casino exists. You are one of the few who look upon it. The Villa is a dumping ground of failed construction. Pre-War junk that has aged poorly. Don't think you'll be leaving so easily. Despite it's shortcomings, I need your help. You won't be leaving this place alive if you think about wandering outside the Villa."

This was... a hell of a situation. His life was literally tied to other lives, ones he'd never known, and he couldn't just leave. He had so many regrets. 

"So. Find these other collars. Bring them back."

"I've downloaded instructions and markers on your Pip-Boy, in case you forget. And yes, I have access to that device on your arm. It seems like it was tampered with... Someone, or an error inside of it, led you purposefully to the bunker."

"You're joking." He looked at the Pip-Boy. Right now, it only displayed a map of the surrounding area. "How could that happen?"

"Maybe someone had it out for you. Maybe technology fails at the hands of those who don't know how to use it."

"Hey!"

"I'm low on patience, and you are low on time. Do we understand each other?"

Aberdeen didn't want to say this: "Yes."

"Good."

With that, the projection shut off, being replaced by a hologram of a woman in the center of the fountain. Aberdeen struggled to his feet, lifting the Holorifle with him. He checked: it can only hold four microfusion cells, and there were only about a twenty laying next to it. He stuffed it all in the pockets of the jumpsuit he was wearing, which he noted, was not the same as the outfit he went into the bunker with. Gross! He took a look around the immediate square. His head was spinning, vision blurring. There was a feeling of a sting wherever the jumpsuit he had been granted wasn't covering. Behind him, an unusual vending machine, a slot on the side with the Sierra Madre symbol. By his feet was a casino chip. Out of curiosity, he slid it in that slot. Okay, so, vending machines take chips. He looked in garbage cans, in the small dried-up fountains, and on the ground for more. About fifty. Not bad.

His survival instincts were kicking in. He wanted to be angry. He wanted to go find Elijah and deliver a mouth full of Holorifle juice to him. He wondered about Veronica, how he had been annoyed at her, suspicious of her, when she could be hurt, too. And he thought of Arcade, hurt by his actions. It was a long week without him. A lot of drama for half a month. Arcade shuddered a sigh, looking about him again: the dark red cloud reminded him all too much of the Divide. It was silent here, no marked men to attack, but something lay in the dark, around corners, breathing deep with blood lust, something he would soon discover. Inside the vending machine were mostly snack foods, and, thank God, cigarettes. He bought a pack of those, along with the three healthiest items: YumYum Deviled Eggs, Salisbury Steak, and Dandy Boy Apples. He'd have to come back for a doctor's bag. Immediately he scarfed the food down, still feeling quite hollow. He hoped to find water soon, irradiated or not. Looking at his Pip-Boy, he headed towards the western section of the Villa, towards a map marker simply labeled "Dog."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 90% of this is just game dialogue lmao  
> shoutout to gopher on youtube whose LP helped me get the lines i needed (so i didn't have to play through it AGAIN) and from whom i stole some funny lines he was saying out loud.   
> a few lines were cut just to make it not so dull.
> 
> i could really go for a cannoli right now.


	11. Ante Faciem Domini

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In this 90% dialogue chapter, Aberdeen looks into the face of God himself. Sort of.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> um  
> long chapter ahead! haha, uh  
> sorry

The Villa was seemingly endless and maze like. Every turn, the courier faced a new challenge. Unpickable locks, silhouettes shuffling about, the sting of the concentrated pockets of Cloud corroding away his flesh from the inside out. Upon turning around in the large fountain plaza he had woken up in, he found a gate: one that Elijah warned him would be not smart to go through if he wanted to keep his life, and even made the collar around his neck beep rapidly. Quickly backing away, Aberdeen wandered westward into the corridors. He would quickly find himself turned around, so Aberdeen found a piece of – of something, whatever it was, something he could write on the walls with, and marked his way with a simple cross with arrows pointing to the fountain, or 'x's to mark a dead end; breadcrumbs along the trail.

One might not think Courier Six to be a religious man, after trekking the godless wastes and seeing all the damning evidence against the presence of one. Yet, he found comfort in the gospels of old, the promise of a life of paradise after this hellish existence finally sent him to the gallows. He would pray to whoever out there would be listening, though, not actively. The Bible, the holy symbol of eons passed, too was filled with horrors that would be considered barbaric, abysmal, even, but history repeats itself and blood was shed in the name of His greatness. Against those without God, those living in sin of communism. It was a bunch of bullshit, of course, but still Aberdeen yearned for the presence of something, some _one_ who had set the world into motion and would welcome him into the gates of Heaven.

Round and round these impossibly looping corners he came to a stop. There was... something at the end of the path. Someone, perhaps. A voice crackled quitely in his Pip-Boy:

“Ghost people,” Elijah whispered. “Dismember them, or they'll come right back up. If you're sneaky enough, you can get right by them. Don't say I didn't warn you.”

There was no way around it. Abby saw something on the ground behind it, what looked to be ammunition boxes. He prayed he was right, and carefully lifted the Holorifle sight to his eye. The ghost person didn't seem to be moving much, but in the silence of the Villa, he could hear it.. breathing. Ragged, wet gasps that sounded like drowning. He paused when he got a better look at it through the sights:

He knew that suit.

That specific hazmat suit... He had seen it before. This place had a connection to the Big Empty. He noted it mentally to ask Elijah about later, if Elijah was in the mood to be answering questions.

He took aim. Where to? The legs, probably. It was holding onto a spear of some sort. Maybe the arm, then, so it wouldn't be able to throw it. He made his choice and pulled the trigger for the first time, feeling the recoil hit him something nasty. He adjusted quickly enough to look back through the sights to see the ghost person had stumbled backwards from impact. He'd just barely missed the joint of the arm and had landed a hit on the pectoral. Instead of waiting for the ghost person to double back, he shot again, hearing a sickening thump against brick pavement. Precious ammo, wasted. He made sure to check the abomination for anything, but no, it was only holding the spear in the dismembered arm. The hazmat suit it was wearing was corroded in several spots, revealing disgusting red ooze of congealed mass of a hundred years of decay on the inside. The suit itself had grown to become the skin that held together this long-dead human. It reminded him all too much of the Y-17 emergency override harnesses... and he wanted to vomit at the thought of it.

The ammunition boxes, sadly, held nothing. There was a first-aid kit, and an untouched one by the looks of it, too. With glee, Aberdeen opened it: two stimpaks, a med-X, a few bandages. He thanked the heavens and stashed that away into his jumpsuit. He would be needing a bag pretty quickly.

Up a set of stairs. Straight back. Stairs to the right. Ragged breathing nearby. Can't tell from where. His back turned constantly, never lowering his Holorifle. By the stairs in this open area sat a skeleton, one that fell victim to Elijah's trap and the head of a knife spear. There was a caravan rifle aside it, probably the last weapon for that poor person to ever have used, a stimpak, and a few chips. Abby slung it around his back, praying it was in good condition, but he didn't have time to worry about that now. He was exhausted and hungry. Now, more than ever, he needed to find a place to rest. He had taken far too much time in exploring every crevasse he could find for chips, spare parts, and hope.

When in the Divide, he had a voice of guidance, and a single set path. The wind tore at him outwardly. Now, he wandered the maze while the cloud tore at him inwardly.

A single handprint above a bag was there, too, when he looked around a moment longer. He didn't even bother to check it; Aberdeen simply took the whole thing up and dumped what he had in his pockets in there. It was an old twine sack, but it would do, and it relieved some of his weight. He had to be careful of the extra noise it gathered, though, and set his sights for a place of rest. Any closed building... even perhaps a manhole cover...

He headed up the stairs, as there was only the one way to go. Across another small square, he saw another ghost person, squatting and facing away. He took aim, and.. leg, off in one clean shot. He could proceed normally. Every single inch of the Villa was under his scrutiny, so the terminal on the wall was no exception, as was the writing carved haphazardly into the wall beside it:

_THE CASINO HAS OLD MANS COLLAR_

Many letters backwards, like a child had written it. Far too high up for a child to reach, though. Aberdeen activated the terminal. It allowed him to turn on a hologram in the fountain. He jumped at the sight of it, but it was immediately clear to him that it was harmless. It was another two turns and an avoidance of a thick cloud cell to his destination. The square surrounding the police station was suspiciously quiet and empty, save for a few piles of rubble. Aberdeen didn't venture further than that square, despite an area past it that he could see, for he knew that inside the station would be the potential for rest, and to find this “Dog,” whoever they were.

Before entering the station, he paused to read the inscription on the side of the building, next to the door, in the same writing from before:

_FIND GOD IN THE SIMPLIST OF BEASTS._

 

* * *

 

In the walks of the wastes lie many dangers, but nothing strikes fear into the hearts of people like the threat of losing their loved ones. See, humans are, by nature, social creatures, and we cling onto anyone we come across that we can to have something worth holding onto. Friends, family, even a lone robot floating through the Mojave. This dread, the feeling of utter uselessness and lack of hope sank deep into the chest of Arcade Gannon; so much so, that not even tears could be mustered up from inside. He felt empty. Alone. Even with his friend, Veronica Santangelo by his side, weeping and red-faced, he couldn't get worked up. All he knew is this:

“We have to go look for him.”

“Where would we even start?” Veronica sniffled.

“Well, the last place you saw him, to start.” He sighed and leaned back in his chair; it groaned in its age. “Though I doubt he'd want me coming after him.”

“I don't think that's true,” she replied quietly. “He... really... Well, maybe 'love' isn't the word to use here, but...” _Now_ Arcade felt something. Impetus rage, or a hot flash of embarrassment, maybe, but it made him sit up straight again, face turning a familiar shade of red.

“No, no, he did not-”

“That's not what I meant! He really cared about you, Arcade, sorry, I'm just so... flustered..”

“I understand.”

“By the looks of it, you really did, too.” A small smile finally crept onto her face. “I also spotted you two kissing the morning he said you were going back here.” She did, in fact, happen to glance through the window as she was shutting the blinds to see the sight against the rising sun.

“Yuh- wh- ye-” his mouth couldn't find the right words. She was giggling now, tears in the corners of her eyes instead of on her cheeks. _“HE_ kissed _ME_ , not the other way around!”

“Oh, I'm sure it was awful.”

“It was,” he harrumphed.

The alleviation of their sorrows was only temporary. It began to set, much like the sun on this day: “Do you still have the armor?”

“Of course I do. Why he didn't give it to you... I don't know.”

“I wouldn't have worn it, anyway,” Veronica shrugged. “I can't get up close and personal if I'm wearing something restricting, and it would've been too big on me.”

“Mm. I'll... Go don my armor and save our fair maiden.”

“What?”

“Nothing,” he shook his head, standing from his chair with a stretch, “mind going to tell Julie – the woman with the mohawk – that her precious researcher is running off again in the search of glory?”

“You got it.” Veronica stood to leave, but paused at the tent flap, staring out into the open square. “Arcade?”

“Yeah?”

“We're going to find him, right?”

He didn't know how to respond with anything other than, “Yes. We'll find him.”

“...Good.” She left the tent with a melancholic smile. Arcade left the tent, as well, going to the inner portion of the walls surrounding the fort. He found the armor he had hidden away and changed into it, stretching the leather exterior with his long limbs. The helmet always felt a little weird with his glasses on – he couldn't see distant objects very well without them – but this time, it was comforting. He packed a bag with the usual supplies.

Purified water. Empty syringes. Duct tape. Medical bandages. Scotch. Med-X. A single Hydra. Fixer. Cateye. Healing powder. Mentats. MREs that he'd found. Antivenom. A few rare fresh fruits and vegetables. Dried brahmin meat. Bedroll. Flint. A lighter. And the last thing to get packed away in a side pocket was that strange, orange liquid in a bottle that Veronica had brought with her. It was barely a liquid, actually, kind of a sticky-looking substance. A small label in unfamiliar handwriting indicated it as 'cloud residue'. Purely out of scientific curiosity, he popped the cork of it to get a whiff, but what he got made him jerk back and gag. It was strongly sulfuric, and made him taste something akin to blood. Copper, probably. He quickly capped the jar and stashed it away, fanning his face.

Aberdeen's face flashed in his head, an image of him surrounded in a cloud of this substance, choking him, a grisly image that would ring all too true. He wanted to imagine that Aberdeen was in a place away from that, perhaps, sheltered from it. Something in his gut told him otherwise.

“Veronica,” he approached the girl from behind, having completed his quest. She was chatting with Julie this entire time? “Are we ready to set out?”

“Oh, Gannon, don't go off killing yourself, alright?” Julie made a concerned face.

“I won't be, I assure you. I'll come home again.” Home. An unusual word to his tongue.

“I'll be looking forward to it. Please know you'll always have a place to rest and that the Followers will help you however they can, wherever you are.”

“I know, Julie. Thank you. I'll see you later.” With a small farewell embrace, Arcade exited the Old Mormon Fort for what would be the last time in almost a decade.

 

* * *

 

Aberdeen immediately set all of his belongings down on the ground on the inside of the door to the police station. Everything ached. He didn't know if it was from exhaustion, fear, or the looming cloud above corroding him, but it felt good to sit on a cold, hard floor. Then, the urgency of the situation finally hit him: inside the lone cell easily visible from the corner was a nightkin. It was sitting down, hugging its knees, rocking back and forth. Aberdeen's breath hitched. If a place like this could turn one of the wastelands most feared creatures into a shuddering, pathetic thing, then surely it would do the same to him. He was less than excited at the prospect.

The air inside the police station was stale. There was almost an immediate sense of relief when he stepped inside on his skin and in his lungs. He could even feel it in his eyes. Though it wasn't a long exposure, he can only imagine what staying out there for long amounts of time would do to him.

“Where is master..?” A whimper from the cell emerged. “Did he go away? Dog will be good this time...”

“What the fuck,” Aberdeen whispered to himself. “Hey! Dog? Are you Dog?” The nightkin did not respond. He stood, aching, and stepped forward towards the cell. “Hey, I-”

_Beep!_

He stopped in his tracks. Even the nightkin froze in his rocking. Aberdeen's eyes swept back and forth, ears straining for the sound of a radio or speaker.

_Beep!_

He left his guns at the door. Strange, he thought with a dry humor, this isn't a casino.

“Noise makes my stomach hurt,” Dog said.

“Yeah? And it makes my neck itch.”

_Beep!_

The nightkin shuddered again, begging, “Turn the noise off!”

_Beep!.. Beep!..._ Increasing in frequency. Crackling. Left, on his left, on the desk he hurried over to it and switched it off. _Beep!_

“God _damn_ it,” he muttered, frantically looking for the others. Two more were easily spotted and switched off. By the computer, and by the cell. That second one was a little more tricky, being hidden under a desk. A sigh of relief swept through him and he nearly collapsed in gratefulness. He did not, knowing there was several orders of business to attend to:

-Break Dog out of the cell  
-Check out everything in the sack he'd nabbed  
-Loot the police station for all of its valuables  
-Take a nap? Maybe?? That would be nice.

He took a moment to decide. Look into his belongings, first. He moved them away from the door to just around the corner of the partition, then thinking for a second, he barricaded the door. Just in case. Waking up to unfamiliar hands groping at his face was a nightmare he didn't wish to relive. It was with great joy he opened the twine sack to reveal a small treasure trove of goods: a single stimpak, two bottles of water (just by sight he could tell they were not purified, but water was water), a few microfusion cells, and some Blamco Mac&Cheese. That last one required some cooking, but if there was a hot plate around he didn't mind using a little water to make it. Plus, he could drink the water after it was boiled. Wouldn't remove any possible radiation, but he could make do. He took his ammunition and stuck it in the bottom of the bag, tearing a hole small enough so that he could reach in to grab it but not so small as to allow it to rattle its way out. Then he layered on the medical supplies. It was a very empty bag, all in all, but his pockets were easily taken up by everything, and made poor carriers.

Then, it was time to loot the place. He passed by the cage, hearing the nightkin murmuring to itself. He realized it had a bear trap around its arm... and many, many scars on itself.

“What happened to you?” He asked without thinking.

“Puts Dog in cage. Hiding downstairs.”

“Ahuh. Care to clarify?” The nightkin didn't respond. “Guess I'll find out later.” Aberdeen was not fond of super mutants or their cousins, the nightkin, in any way, shape, or form. To him, they were another merciless killer in the wastelands.

The ancient coffee maker by the entrance had a single holotape on it – regardless of what was on it, the courier nabbed that. Then he checked the nearest desk with a terminal on it – much to his glee, a police pistol and a few rounds for it inside. Fully loaded, thankfully, so he set the safety on and simply put it into his pocket. Would be good for shooting any speakers or radios, not so great for those walking dead in the Villa. He read through the entries in the terminal. Nothing exciting, but some information about an evidence room with a few things stashed in it. Anything he could get his hands on was good news. Maybe things wouldn't be so awful here, he thought. He could survive this. The other desk in the main lobby of the station also held a police pistol, which Aberdeen quickly took apart to repair the first one he'd found. Well, maybe not quickly, but as quick as anyone in a dire situation would be able to do.

Around the partition sat a room that looked to be a break room of sorts. Refrigerators, hot plates, even a table with a chessboard and – thank the heavens – a first aid box. Though, it only had two empty syringes in it. He'd take them. A helmet on the counter was a pleasing sight. He would pick it up much later, after a well-deserved rest. There was only a single Cram in one of the fridges. Fair enough. It's protien, he supposed. He took the hot plate and its accompanying pot to make the mac and cheese, using only enough water to cover the pasta. It stuck to the pot. He ate it anyway, ravenous, even after his 'meal' a few hours prior.

“Dog hungry...” He heard a whine from the cell. Or as whiny as a gruff nightkin voice could get. He stared down at the Cram, frowning.

“Here,” he stepped around the corner and tossing the can into the cell, “eat this.” It clanged on the ground, as most cans would. Dog made a swift movement to nab it, so fast that even Aberdeen didn't see it, but he heard the crunching of the nightkin chewing the entire thing whole.

“Get away while you can,” he said, finally turning to face the courier as he passed towards the right of the cage, “before he comes back.”

“Who?”

Dog only looked down at his chest, where Aberdeen finally saw, only a glimpse though, of the letters carved in his chest:

G O D

To the nightkin, would read D O G looking down. An interesting take on ambigram script, even if unintentional. Dog quickly turned back to face the corner. Alrighty then. Aberdeen moved into the hallway past the cage. There were a number of doors, one of them being a bathroom, he guessed by the sign on the wall. The one in the corner had nothing in it, nothing, except, a briefcase and a white hand print on the wall. He recognized it from before, there was one above the sack he found. Inside the briefcase was another stash. A marker. Someone had made stashes around the Villa, only further benefiting his situation. He felt all too lucky in these discoveries. This stash included:

-.375 magnum rounds, 3  
-three stimpaks (what a find)  
-a half drunken bottle of scotch  
-five bobby pins  
-a knife  
-18 energy cells  
-a package of Dandy Boy Apples  
-one bottle of dirty water

He would take all but the energy cells. None of the three weapons he'd found required them, and hey – if he ever needed them? He knew where to go. Onto the next door. He stepped slowly, wary of radios. The door opened without issues, no radio or speaker to be found upon checking about the room. Lockers lined the walls, circling around to a desk by the door that had another terminal. He read the entries on it, checking the time while doing so, and realized it was getting later and later and the exhaustion was really setting in. He couldn't sleep now, though, no. On a bench lay a neatly folded pile, stacked high with... armor. Truly, this place kept on giving. Aberdeen sank to his knees and sent a thanks to the Gods above. It wasn't in the best condition after years of use and many more of disuse, but it would make do. In that moment, he regretted tearing that hole in the bag, as this armor had plentiful space to put ammunition into it. There wasn't much else in way of that room that he could use, as he wasn't much interested in the C-4 in the cabinet he unlocked.

The hallway had only one other interesting room in it, with an ammo press inside. With hardly anything on him he would make note of this as well and return to it if needed. Then came time to find out what lay on the other half of the station. The courier doubled back, stepping through the doors into the hallway and feeling his stomach drop at the _beep_ that followed it. His head swiveled left: no visible radio. He made a large step to check right around the corner and leaped onto the radio to turn it off. He'd rather not use ammo on anything he didn't need to while he still had some. He sighed in relief, hearing the nightkin in the other room do the same. He didn't think nightkin _could_ sigh. You learn something new every day! When Abby finally looked around this area he noticed more cells. Cells with skeletons in them. Cells with skeletons on _beds_ in them. The hunger inside him for sleep roared and almost overcame him right then and there, but he reminded his tired soles that now was not the time.

What it was time for was a trip down the stairs he saw, into the basement.

 

* * *

 

“We're not even going to stop by the Outpost?”

It was dusk, and the pair had been walking at a steady, quick pace the last few hours. They had run into more than they accounted for: fire geckos, coyotes, and even some Fiends, so travel was delayed enough as it was.

“Nope,” said Arcade matter-of-factly.

“Arcade, we have to sleep at some point.”

“Maybe you do.”

Veronica jogged forward, as she was a few paces behind her companion, and reached out to tug at his arm. He stopped marching to look towards her, a dead look on his face.

“What is it?”

“Don't do this to yourself. Don't make me be your voice of reason.” With a hard look, he tugged his arm away. “Arcade!”

“Go ahead and find a place to sleep if you like. I'm going with or without you.” He faced the road before him and trudged forward. In truth, Veronica was not that tired. She wasn't even sure she could sleep with the guilt eating away at her. So she did what most women in the face of an angry man would do: stayed silent, kept her head down, and kept walking. Not that she was weak, or that Arcade was a misogynist; she was too tired emotionally to fight. Normally, she would have punched some sense into him, but she wanted to find Aberdeen as badly as the doctor did. Their short time with Courier Six had impacted them both greatly, whether or not they wished to admit it.

Aberdeen MacGabhann, born in an unknown year, estimated himself to be 29, though the Auto-Doc in the Big Empty said he was 32. He remembered only his first name, but found “MacGabhann” inscribed on the underside of his Pip-Boy, despite receiving it from Doc Mitchell, and took it on as his last name. Still felt young, full of life, and had an adventure in his heart. 5'9”, he stands to be five inches shorter than Arcade, but six taller than Veronica. This is information he only passed on in casual conversation. He didn't know his blood type; did it really matter? He didn't know his exact birthday, but likes to think that the day he crawled out of the grave in Goodsprings was a day of new birth. He made a joke, much to the distaste of his companions, that he was like Jesus, killed and then reborn again. With all the good things he has done for the people of the Mojave, he had been referred to as a savior. A messiah. He would not let these things get to his head, he said with a laugh.

“I'm just doing what feels right.”

They each loved him. Love, you see, is not limited to the romantic kind, though the kind growing in Gannon's heart was to become that. Veronica felt a kinship to him in his noble pursuit, despite his ties with the NCR, and Arcade? Well, how could a Follower of the Apocolypse find fault in someone who wished to purge the world of a great evil and help those who cannot help themselves? A healer. A friend. Love was what pushed them to walk through the endless, cold night, over sand dunes and sneaking through collections of sleeping foes. Aberdeen would have done the same for either of them, they were sure.

Morning came, and the pace had slowed. They had neither eaten nor paused to rest at all, and they were becoming dehydrated. But they were close, so close.

“Just south of Camp Forlorn Hope,” Veronica had said. “By the river. In a sewer grate.”

“Odd place to build a bunker. But smart, though, if you wanted to stay hidden away without suspicion.”

They had just passed where HELIOS One lay to the west, and took a turn to the east. Windmills rose up above a hill.

“This is – I recognize this place, so we're on the right track. Be careful, though, we ran into a bunch of cazadores out here. I suspect there might be more where those came from.”

“Great,” Arcade replied bitterly. Last thing either of them needed was to be poisoned. He had antivenom, but cazadores were notably hard to put down, and if one doesn't die from the poisoning they could die from their sheer persistence. There were dozens, maybe more, of several-day-old cazador corpses laying on their path, flies buzzing about and a small pack of wild dogs who seemed to them like they wouldn't bother the pair if they kept moving along. Past the shack, up the hill, down the hill, and another mile, give or take, until their destination. No cazadores, much to their relief. It was actually... really, disturbingly quiet. The river they were coming upon was silent, and not even the wind blew. Just the sound of padding feet and heavy breath.

The sewer grate in question lay in a small crater right above the river. It wasn't an actual grate, but had the appearance of one. There were the actual bars themselves, but below it was another layer of metal to ensure that rain wouldn't come flooding down below. It took the two of them together to heft it up, as it did when Veronica and Aberdeen had visited it the first time. They descended.

“Weird,” Veronica commented, “that radio was on when I left. I still wouldn't go down into that room if I were you, though, because as soon as he stepped in there...” Her mouth twisted. A distraught expression set itself on her face.

“Hey, hey,” Arcade said quietly. “This... This isn't your fault.”

“It _was_ , though!”

“No- Veronica, no. Just, no. You did a bad thing, yes, but you are not to blame for his disappearance. You couldn't have known that he would be taken from here. Come on, now.” He wanted to tell her not to cry, but that would be the wrong thing to say. She was slowly ambling down the hall, taking a left turn before the radio room, her sniffles starting up.

“His... his stuff is in here. We should start looking at.. all of this to try to find clues.”

 

* * *

 

“Knew you would come, below the cage... down to where I am. Maybe you saw the letters I scratched on the Villa walls.”

Aberdeen was thrown for a second. The voice sounded... very close to Dog's, but softer, in a way. More articulate, that's for sure. “Who are you?”

“A little farther. Follow my voice... that's it.” Here it became clear to the courier that it was a recording. The basement of the station was damp and dark, and being down here made him almost chilly. It felt almost... haunted, down here. The entire Villa, he would come to learn, was haunted. “The one in the cage? Dog,” the recording continued. “I had to lock him up. He keeps disobeying me.”

“I am way too sober for this,” Abby muttered.

_GOD IS WATCHING_ , said an inscription on the wall. The courier ignored this and continued through the basement. The first small room had some crates... and he heard the distinct sound of a broken radio nearby. It shook him, because through the static and crackling, the long-gone voices sounded like they were crying out for help. He hesitated stepping into the room. As he approached the terminal, his collar made that familiar _beep!_ He stepped back, surveying the room, even peering into the crates. There... was nothing in here. No speaker. He'd have to chance running around them to check, and as he did, he noticed the collar stopped, and even didn't beep as he proceeded down the hallway. The next two rooms and hallways had nothing in them, save for a few chips. The final room in the basement had a radio laying on the table right in front of him, he saw as he opened the door. Though the beeping irritated his neck as he stepped forward, at least it was easy to turn off. Abby went forward without fear.

“That's me, on the table there... My voice. Can't take any chances, though... you may be some victim who simply stumbled down here. If so, can't you let Dog out... no, not yet.” This voice was intelligent enough to have spaced the messages out long enough for someone to explore, or knew enough about electronics to set up a trip-style system for the messages. “If you're who I think you are, you came to fetch Dog, use him to drag others here. Now I'll use you – and that Pip-Boy you're wearing.” Okay, so maybe not. This other voice was watching him. “You're smart. Clever. The key to Dog's cage is simple. Take my voice to the cage above. Let me speak to the beast inside. Then you and I... we can talk.”

“I... would prefer to talk now, if that's okay.”

Nothing.

He took the holotape off the desk and went back upstairs. Looking between the cells lined in the hallway, and the one large one for Dog... Aberdeen squinted. Rest now, or another time? There may not be another time, in a place as safe as this is. Dog.. Dog could wait. No matter how long it had taken him to be dragged out to wherever the hell this place was, even being unconscious the entire time, he needed to do it. He pulled a skeleton off the one mattress that didn't have springs sticking up through it, hastily took off his jumpsuit, and half-slept for the next several hours, jumping awake at the slightest of noises. The fear would push him into a night of terrors.

 

* * *

 

He wasn't well-rested by any means, but the time on his Pip-Boy indicated that he had to get a move on. With a groan, Abby sat up and retrieved his jumpsuit. That thing was riddled with holes, and he knew there was a set of armor in the other room... So he opted to leave it on the floor, instead, and retrieve the armor. Dog was oddly quiet throughout that. Armor and helmet in place, he looked at the holotapes he'd collected. One, labeled “VM COD STEADY.” The other, the 'key' to the cell. He played that one.

“DOG! Back in your cage!” It jarred the courier. It was the voice from before, over the recording, or whatever it was. He looked to see the nightkin standing and dusting itself off.

“Oh, good, you're finally getting up.”

“You fed him,” said Dog. But... not in the voice Dog had before. In the voice from the basement, from the holotape. “Why would you do that?”

“I'm not the type of person to let others starve.”

The nightkin turned, taking a heavy step towards the cell door. He towered over the courier, and would best Arcade by almost two feet.

“You weren't who I was expecting. I'm disappointed. Still... even if you aren't my intended guest, you take direction. Good. You can't have been an idiot to figure out how to release me from my cage. Or, perhaps you are, with that leash on your arm and the one around your neck. With our collars and manacles, why, we may as well be kin.”

“What happened to your voice?”

“I'm the voice of reason. I sleep sometimes... down in the basement, in the cage. Now that I'm awake, Dog goes back in the cage. Dog knows I'm here, but can't do anything about it. I'm his... conscience. Keep him tame, keep him from hurting us... doing foolish things. I've been trapped in here for some time, then you came along and let me out. So... you opened my cage for a reason. Now, I want to know why.”

Boy, these guys could talk a lot.

“...In super mutants, brain damage is usually the result of prolonged stealth boy usage.” He recognized this: multiple personality disorder. He'd seen it in humans, usually after lots of drug usage, but some were born with it. He'd read about this before, in some handwritten medical journal at a ranger station.

“That's the _easy_ explanation, the ones humans use. Pre-War technology, as if it's the cause of all ills, mind and body.”

“I didn't say that.”

“I _needed_ to come out of the cage, to protect Dog. From clever humans... like you. Do you see these wounds of his, covering his skin... the bear trap on his arm? He placed his own hand in it.” Abby grimaced. “The name he carved in his chest? To remind him of who he is, he inflicts pain on himself to silence me, when all I try to do... Hrr!” He hissed. “He cuts, hurts, and tries to murder me out of him. He won't succeed. Just makes me angrier. Dog is the beast. We simply change cages. Like the ones here.”

“That... okay, well, you're definitely more intelligent than him, but... why does he do that to you? To himself?”

“It's almost like a war. I want to help him, guide him to the right place in life, but he thinks that he should be his own self. Dog... is not smart, needs a master to guide him. I am his master. Not that human in the casino. Now, human, tell me why you let me out of the basement.”

“I'm looking for someone with a collar like mine,” he tugged at it. The skin around his neck where it sat felt almost raw, like he had been picking at it all night. “Where is yours?”

“It's close. Closer than I'd like... Dog's been into things, needs to think before he eats, chew before he swallows. He's... eager that way. Now the collar's a part of me. Inside, I can feel its electronic heartbeat, clicking and burning down below... Like before. It was cold and heavy before going in the cage... now you're here, and it's pulling and kicking again, tugging like a leash. Interesting.”

“Dog said his stomach hurt... if that collar inside you is active, I'm not the one who switched it on.”

“Really? Yet it led you here, to me. And now you're here, and it's burning a hole in my guts. Maybe it's crying for its owner.”

“I am _not_ the owner of this piece of shit technology. You really think I'd put it on myself and risk blowing my head – and yours! - off just to gain your trust? Nuh-uh. I don't play these kinds of mind games, mutie.”

At that, the nightkin busted a gut, laughing. “You have nerve, human, calling me a name that many have before. What is your intent, hm? To rile me up? It won't work. I have much anger inside me, yes... but if what you say is true, then perhaps we need to not be at each others throats... the collar does that enough as it is.”

It was right. The courier crossed his arms. “Fine. Well, you wouldn't have locked yourself in without a way out.”

“The key is the Old Man. I hid the key on me so Dog wouldn't know... I just need the Old Man to show up, so he and I can talk. If Dog was in control when the Old Man appeared, well, he would just do whatever he commanded, as always. And I can't have that.”

“Tell me what you know of this 'Old Man'.”

“Elijah. Human. Weak, like all of you are. Feeling age circling him like starved dogs, howling for blood. To me, he reeks of age and failure. And madness. To me, he is simply the 'Old Man'. To dog, he is 'Master'. His name, meaningless. Running out of years, hopes and dreams running through his withered hands like sand from the Big Empty... and scorched by the sun.”

“You.. know about the Big Empty. Do you know about it from Elijah?”

“You have been there?”

“Yes. Those maniac scientists removed my brain. I got it back, though.”

“I underestimated you, human. Surviving such a place takes great strength.”

“I had been through worse.” He sighed, feeling again, the pang of hunger and sleep inside him. A restless night made his mind swim. “Forget it. I had other questions.”

“Of course you do,” he seemed annoyed. “And so do I.”

“You were waiting for Elijah to show up, then, hm?”

“Ah... the Old Man obsessed with the Sierra Madre. Riddled with greed. Hoped you might be him when I woke up. All you are is his hand... you're the same kind of greed. Followed the radio, the broadcast, and now you're here, all confused. Not for long. You'll figure it out.” Aberdeen felt an anger rising inside of him.

“I,” he seethed, “did not follow the signal. That place. That bunker... I was following a marker on my map. Human idiocy? Perhaps, but make no mistake – I am NOT here for whatever bullshit lies within that casino.”

“Hah! You're an extension of the Old Man's grasp, clumsy, perhaps, but a tool, yes. And once you get acclimated to the Sierra Madre? Then you'll feel the same overpowering hunger the Old Man does. And then you'll _be_ him, not just his hand.”

Aberdeen wanted to spit in the face of this monster. But he bit his tongue, instead asking, “So, you... Do you know how I got here, then?”

“Of _course_ I know. Even if I don't see it happen – down in the cage, I hear echoes of the footfalls, the click of the collars. Every time I see one of you, I know how you got here. Dog comes for you, drags you here.”

Aberdeen had enough of standing up, taking seat in the ancient chair by the desk outside the cage. “So you brought me here to the Villa.”

“Me? You think I want to haul bodies around the wastes like a Brahmin at the whip? No, Dog does it, when the Old Man says fetch, Dog fetches. You were in a man-trap, and Dog made his rounds, and dragged you here. When, I don't know. But... it must have been...” He pondered a moment. “Recent. Before the cage.” Abby's eyes flew open at this.

“So- so you know the way back, then?!”

“The way back doesn't matter!... Try to leave, try to disobey, and your collar ends the journey faster than you can say 'begin again'.”

“So it's not just a threat, then... it's real.”

“Indeed. You're clever; you'd be able to find a way back if you left the Villa. Dog can... _I_ can find the way back, if 'back' is where I even wanted to go. Until the Old Man lets you go, you're going nowhere. This beautiful paradise,” he said with as much poison in his voice as that in the air, “with all its toxins and death... it's home.“These... radios, were you using them for signal interference? Your voice came on when I went downstairs... you're easily smart enough to do such a thing.”

“They were here when I arrived, so I made use of them,” said God in a surprised tone. “More their... voices, really. These collars... they don't just track us. You can eavesdrop on them as well. Tune to a frequency, and you can hear everything someone is saying. So perhaps it's a good thing that Dog swallowed his collar. Anyone listening would find it difficult to hear past the... digestion.”

Abby hummed a chuckle. “You're blocking the eavesdropping with the alarm outside, too. Nice. I underestimated you, as well.”

“Very good. Yes, it's another layer of white noise to ensure privacy. Unfortunately, it's also acted as a dinner bell for the residents. As long as the holographic greeter outside is active, however, I can get by them... the holograms fascinate them. Ghost-worship, perhaps.”

“An interesting idea, if such a concept exists in those hollow heads of theirs.”

“Yes... Dog will eat them, like he did the collar, if given the chance.”

“Oh really now?” He sat forward in his chair. “That'd be mighty helpful. Save me some ammo, or keep my weak little stomach from seeing them spew blood as I butcher them with a knife. Maybe we should get you out of there, eh?”

“No.”

“Excuse me?” Abby almost laughed, sputtering.

“No, I don't think so. Even in here, I have more control than you do. I'm not leaving until the one who controls the collars shows... not his voice, not his hand, not his lackey... _him_. And when he comes to see me, we'll settle things. So,” he made the motion of shooing, “go on, go back to your master, tell him I'm waiting for him. Dog may follow him – I won't.”

He sat back again, clicking his tongue in consideration. “He'll kill us,” he said after a moment of silence. “Surely you realize this. He'll kill us both. Do you want to die? Cooperate, or you'll both – _we'll_ both die.”

“Then I'd still win. I'd rather die in a cell than have Dog follow him any longer, follow _his_ orders, _his_ commands, desperate for recognition. The Old Man... he has the need to hold on, on to the past, to the Madre...” God sighed, then continued sadly, “I'd rather be free, let go of this shell, than to have it cage me any longer.”

Unwillingness to listen to reason. This felt all too familiar to how Ulysses once acted towards his fellow courier, but at least the man relented and they made their peace. Aberdeen hated to do this: “I bet I could command Dog to get out of the cage. He'd be willing to listen.”

“Hm hm hm!” God chuckled. “Dog? You're not talking to him now, are you? No, even if you could drag Dog out of his cage, you still couldn't get him out of _this_ cage,” he gestured to the large cell. “I put him here for a reason... if he could have escaped, he would have. So here he stays.”

His head hurt. Abby desperately wished he had a Mentat. “If he hears the Old Man's voice, he'll do what the Old Man says. Right?”

“Dog... obeys, yes... why, do you have some means of contacting the Old Man?”

“Nooooo, ho ho ho, but! I have his voice. On my Pip-Boy. Just. Like. Yours.”

“You-! Don't you play it!” God reached out and grasped the bars of the cell, leaning in menacingly. Aberdeen didn't flinch. “If you do... I'll- I'll find a way to get out of this cage, and you... I'll murder you, crush your arms and legs until..” He trailed off, leaving the rest to the courier's imagination. He wouldn't budge at it.

For a moment, he considered giving God the option of not playing it, if he would follow him willingly. _Ah, but, he could say yes, and then rip my head off._ “Goodbye, whoever you are... I'm going to let Dog out of his cage.”

“No, no don't! I'll make you suffer for this, I promise you! Although it may not matter. I suspect the Sierra Madre will be reward enough for ones like _you,_ ” he spat.

It was already loaded up, and playing. The nighkin seemed to jerk back and shudder, and then:

“Master?”

Good boy.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hooray for convenient plot devices!


	12. P 23:4

Where had the time gotten to?

It was early, early morning, long before any farmer would rise to tend to his herd, before soldiers would switch for their shifts, in the time of morning that a dew had settled in in the north of the Mojave, and when the sun rises, it would turn it into a fog. Arcade rubbed his eyes, shifting uncomfortably in the chair. He had spent the night systematically reading through entries on the terminal in the bunker, leafing through notes, and even reading books to try to find...

...Anything. Asides, bookmarks, annotations. Clues, of any type, a map, whatever could point him in the direction of the Sierra Madre.

Sleep had taken Veronica. She was slumped over a pile of papers on the other end of the table. She hadn't intended to fall asleep, but Arcade couldn't fault her. Most humans find it hard to continue on after a mere 16 hours of being awake, but nearly two full days? Everything felt fuzzy to him. The doctor would read a passage, but have to re-read it twice or even thrice. Eventually it got to the point where he had to stare at a word, comprehend it, then move onto the next, trying to remember how they all fit together. This jigsaw of motive, questionable at best morals, and mystery lay in front of and around him. Floating about. It just... made no sense.

He licked his lips, blinking a few times and letting loose a shaky sigh. Wearily, he stood and went to the strange vending machine in the corner of the room, deposited a few chips from the slot Veronica had discovered them in, and poured himself a shot of scotch to ease his troubled mind into the realm of sleep.

 

* * *

 

Dog was a very, very good boy. Aberdeen felt the _strangest_ urge to reach up and give him a pat on the head, but swallowed it down and gathered his stuff.

“Insides growling,” Dog said off-handedly.

“We will eat soon, Dog. Don't worry, master won't make you go hungry.” He hoped that the nightkin would prove to be useful. “Are you ready go go?”

“If master goes, Dog will follow.”

With that, he took the board he'd wedged under the doorknob out, mounted the holorifle in his hands, and carefully took step back out into the Villa. The cloud-ridden air stung at his skin, and he took in a hiss of air (regretfully) that felt like barbs to his lungs. The Villa was not kind to him, and its residents weren't, either. Straight ahead, a ghost person jerked awkwardly at the sound of the creaking door. The courier swore under his breath at the rusted hinges, raising the sights on his holorifle. He took aim, stepping out the door when he heard a bone-chilling screech from his left. Another.

“Fuck!”

And Dog rushed forward.

Abby changed his focus to his left, as that one was closer, taking aim at its legs. Mistake number one. The ghost person had in its hand a bottle, and though it seemed like they had been long dead inside those hazmat suits, it turns out they were a lot smarter than just gunk inside. It lighted the bottle and smashed it down at Abby's feet, sending up a column of flame in his face. Some of the alcohol from the cocktail splashed onto his lower extremities, and the heat singed on him. He leapt backwards, kicking his knees high to pat smother the flames via his palm, when he heard... a disturbance from where Dog was. The sound of bones crunching and flesh squelching.

“Are you eating that fucking thing?! Oh, shit,” he became distracted once again by the ghost person stumbling forward, fist raised high. He managed to dodge the blow, barely, and was just in the right position to shove his holorifle into the stomach of the ghost person and fire off a round. It blew backwards, skidding to a stop at the still-burning alcohol spill it had created. It writhed for a moment, but he took no chances, and pulling out the knife he had discovered, dove atop it and hacked at its leg until it was enough to rip off the torso. The struggle from the body stopped. Panting, Aberdeen quickly backed off, away from the heat of the fire, and turned to Dog.

“Dog is full now,” the nightkin said with a grin. It was a gruesome sight. “Swallow something bad,” his grin twisted, “taste like burnt wires.”

“Yeah, that would be the collar. Come on, now. I'm taking you to the fountain. You'll be safe there.”

Were there always this many ghost people? He encountered another three on the way back, Dog enjoying their corpses as snacks. Whatever noises they made... whatever doors were opened, seals unlocked... the ghost people would come out of the woodwork and find their toy. To kill them, to drag them away and do an unknown manner of things to them. Those things... they're fast. They moved in speeds Aberdeen didn't think possible, darting back and forth, shifting with a blue light, getting into his face before Dog would pull them off and throw them against the wall. He could taste their breath under his helmet. Under the sulfur, under the copper, under the sting of fire, there was the distinct scent of halitosis and rotting flesh. They were human, alright. Were being the key word: they haven't been human in a long, long time.

And then there it was, straight ahead: the fountain. Aberdeen paused to consider this for a moment, looking at his Pip-Boy. The medical district... it was just to his left, through a door. Christine was there. Did he want to go into this alone? Did he want to leave Dog to fend for himself in the Villa, despite the safety of the fountain? Did he really want to go searching through the residential district for Dean at this moment?

The answer to all three of those were no.

“Dog, we're doubling back. We need to pick up someone else before going to the fountain.”

 

* * *

 

“Arcade. Are you ever going to wake up?”

“Mmh?” Veronica shook his shoulders again. “'m awake,” he mumbled.

“Arc, you've been sleeping for almost ten hours.”

“Whuzzat?” That shook him a little more, and the tired man lifted his head. “Ten... hours?” His face felt wet. He wiped the drool from his face.

“Yeah. I woke up maybe four hours ago. I don't know, I haven't been keeping track. I made food.”

“Oh... What's for breakfast?”

“Um... some oatmeal, hope you're okay with that.”

“Where did you manage to find that?”

“Some people have farms, Arc. It's not a hard thing to grow in some areas, believe it or not. And there's coffee, but it's not nearly as good as the coffee in California,” she sighed wistfully.

“I grew up in California, too. I miss the coffee. It was real coffee.” He yawned, taking a cup from her with a thank-you. “Did you find anything in the last few hours?”

“Not as much as I'd like... A lot of it is droning on about the treasures of the Sierra Madre, some of it about the Brotherhood...” She took a stack of papers and tapped them to straighten them out. “This is the stuff I haven't gone through yet.”

“That... isn't a lot.”

“I'm afraid we won't find anything useful in this, either. I'm... starting to think we might have to ask some people down at Hidden Valley if they knew anything about this.”

“Not excited at the prospect of that, but if this is a dead end, then so be it.” He hummed and sipped the coffee. Blech. The bunker had been mostly silent, aside from the buzz of the lights and drone of a still-working generator. Something new awoke under that noise, and both Arcade and Veronica craned their neck to listen to it. It was... a voice, of some sort.

_You hear that too?_ She mouthed to him, pointing out into the hall. He nodded, quietly getting up from his seat. They tiptoed around the corner to peer into the empty room that neither of them had dared to venture into. The radio _was_ still on, but on a station that had mostly been silent up until now.

“..ged poorly, like the Madre.” Veronica gasped.

“That's- that's Father Elijah,” she whispered. Arcade hushed her.

“Pre-War junk,” he continued. “The speakers emit a signal that'll set off your collar if you stay too long.” Those words made their hairs stand on end. The doctor turned to his companion and mouthed, _collar_? She nodded with a grim look. They shuffled forward to get a better listen to the radio. “There are damaged speakers... and shielded ones... The damaged ones you can destroy at range – don't get close – you can't switch them off like a radio.”

“What,” they simultaneously whispered in concerned confusion. Then, another voice.

“Uh... okay. Shit.”

Aberdeen. Without thinking, the pair scuttled over to the radio, intently studying it. It was picking up a signal, unbeknownst to them, one from Abby's Pip-Boy. They memorized the station. It was down on the low, low end, and even at top volume, it was very quiet.

“Dog hungry,” said another, gruff voice.

“I just said we'll eat soon, Dog. Don't you trust master? I bet there's even a few ghost people around here for you to snack on. Let's not dawdle.”

“Yes, master.”

And then, silence.

“Holy shit,” Veronica exclaimed. “That.. that was Abby...”

“What was that about a collar? Do you know? You're a scribe, so maybe-”

“Yes, yes,” she nodded, “I was just getting to that, the collar... It could be explosive, and that's why Elijah said that it might get set off.”

“Explosive?!” Arcade's hands flew up to his head. “What... why.. what!!”

“The Brotherhood uses explosive collars to keep people in line. Make them do what they want to do. They can be set within certain parameters and if someone goes outside of them – boom.” She shook her head slowly. “Elijah... I knew you were an ass, but this?”

Arcade's hands went from his head, dragging down his face in disbelief. “I... he's trapped there, wherever he is, then. Like a slave. I've known some people to be fitted with those collars... Seen them come in for treatment from their memories of it, shell-shock kind of thing.” Their eyes met and a single thought resonated between them:

“We need to find him.”

 

* * *

 

It only took a few steps before the beeping started again. He jumped back, pressing a hand of warning against Dog's torso. Speakers, huh? He took out his pistol, instead of wasting precious ammo for his other two, better weapons.

“Dog, wait here a moment.”

“Dog will stay.”

The courier stepped forward a bit, under the first archway. The beeping tickled his neck, vibrating at an uncomfortable speed. Up ahead was a face graffitied onto the tile of the next archway, in the shape of a sad face with two x's for eyes, and an arrow pointing up at the speaker. One shot did the trick, and the beeping stopped. “Dog? You can come, now.”

“Yes, master!” And forward they went. There was the unmistakable sound of breath and groaning from a ghost person nearby. Not in the immediate vicinity, of course, but it was coming... from the right. A swift turn, pistol still in hand – well, shit – and three rounds fired at the head. Better than nothing, right? It fell to the ground with the familiar sickening thump that they all did. It would never get old.

“Dog, dinner's ready. Fetch.” The nightkin ran forward and tore off limbs, devouring hands, feet, and portions of leg whole. The color of the blood, the smell, oh, _God_ , the _smell,_ nothing in this entire place was pleasant. Aberdeen suddenly realized he didn't want to keep whatever remained in his stomach down, and threw off his helmet to retch. Over the sound of his sickness, he heard Dog yell, and the sound of fighting. He looked up to watch the nightkin throw a punch at yet another ghost person. That didn't stop it, though, and a stray knife spear grazed the courier's arm.

“Raaaarrrghhhh!” The sound of something wet. Then, more crunching, masticating. How Abby was able to keep this sickness down before was a mystery to him. Maybe it was the adrenaline. Maybe it was that these particular ones were ripe with the scent of death. He was thankful, though, that there was a medical clinic nearby, even if long abandoned. He shook himself off and downed a bottle of water before pressing on. There was not much to note on, even in the next squared-off section, except for a few ammunition boxes. The writing on the wall above them read:

_If anyone finds this, I'm so sorry you're here._

It was much neater than Dog's... or, God's... whomever wrote the ones before... and wasn't scratched in, but written with a utensil of some sort. Aberdeen, for whatever reason, added a cross beside that, and muttered a prayer.

There was a short corridor ahead, with more graffiti. “Boom,” and an arrow. But he could see no speaker! He asked Dog to wait again, sprinting to the other side of the corridor. His collar stopped beeping at the other end, right in front of the gift shop, but it was a bad idea to do such a thing, as most ideas in this place turned out to be, because greeting him to his right was a ghost person ambling its way down another corridor. He had barely enough time to drop his pistol and pull out the holorifle, making a shot before it was down in his sights. It continued towards him, screeching. He had nowhere to go but back. _Beep!_ Oh, not now, you. He took another shot, raising his arms to defend a hit. There was a sting, and a crunch at his elbow.

That thing was utilizing a bear trap as a weapon. This was all too familiar for the courier. He couldn't react, only shoot, shoot for his life at the ghost person, hearing the beeping getting quicker on his collar. It finally fell with a blast to its arm – the same one the bear trap was on – blowing it into chunks, and the courier fell atop it. The pain screamed at him in his arm, and sweat poured down his face. He looked back, back at Dog, back at the archways.

“Boom,” with an arrow. He looked up, swung his rifle towards the blue light, and shot the speaker as the beeps became indiscernible from the beating of his own heart.

“Dog!” He cried out. “Dog, come!” The nightkin's feet padded towards him. Aberdeen's sight was clouded with red, with pain. The sting of the cloud entered his blood. He wanted to scream. “Dog, pick me up, move me away from this thing.” He did. “Remove my bag, agh, fuck,” his voice grew weak. “Fuck, if only Arcade were here... Open it, Dog, hand it to me – good boy – shit.”

How silly he felt to be treating the nightkin with kindness even when blood ran free from his body. He tore the cloth from his arm, not entirely though, observing it quickly – there was no break, the crunch was from the armor in the arm taking the brunt of the blow. Still the bear trap had managed to pierce skin, and it felt more painful than it would've, if not for the cloud poisoning him.

“Okay, okay,” he gasped. “Just need... Just need some bandages. I'll be fine. You'll be fine, MacGabhann.” He took a deep breath and took the square of cloth he'd ripped, dabbed it with some water, wiped the wound, and bandaged it. He took another breath, trembling. There was a pit in his stomach, and not an unfamiliar one of a brush with death. Death was unavoidable. He had experienced it before, or as close to death as one can get, and yet felt as though he'd passed through its hands like sand. Time escaped the courier, and the courier escaped death. One day, the reaper would sit beside Courier Six on the front stoop of a barnhouse he had built, watch the grandchildren run amok in the muddy fields of California, and give his friend a glass of ice-cold Sunset Sarsaparilla, rimmed with arsenic, and he would finally pass on from this world to the next. Now, though, would not be the time. He was sturdier than that, built to last and endure things far worse than a nick to the skin.

The medical clinic was a blessing to see. He hadn't bothered going into any other doors but that one. He asked that Dog wait outside, keep intruders from getting in. Also, though he didn't want to admit it, Dog's constant whining was getting on his nerves. There was much of the usual stuff one might expect in the reception area of a clinic, when a voice startled him.

“Picking up an emitter signature – watch for security holograms, dangerous,” spoke Elijah. “Don't shoot them. Attacking them is useless.”

The security terminal on the wall had entries that confirmed this. The holograms, after all, were just projections of light, why would anyone bother attacking them? Currently, there was one patrolling the second floor. He didn't bother with changing that, not now, at least. The room had two small treasures: one of those white handprint stashes, and a holotape that read VM COD STIMPK on it. Stimpak? Oh, these were – he would have to get to one of those vending machines soon. If he could buy stimpaks, he would be in the clear. He didn't like the idea of using them as his sole method of healing wounds, but he'd come across quite a number of them already. In the Mojave, stimpaks were a last-resort item. They were far and few between, and only a few people knew how to make them.

“We'll run out of hospitals to loot one day,” Arcade had said, or something to that effect. He was right, though. For now, it was his only way of healing. Except, he heard a familiar whirring... upstairs, something... banging. An Auto-Doc? Yes, that'd make sense... But first, the stash. He noticed something on the inside of this briefcase, a name. “PROPERTY OF DEAN DOMINO.” It was a label, one that had been made for the owner of the case before the war. Dean, eh? The same Dean that was on his Pip-Boy? _Could be just a coincidence,_ he thought, _it's not like his name is Aberdeen._ He took a look inside – nothing very special. A few 9 mm rounds, a knife, and a bag of potato crisps. For a stash inside a medical facility, the expectations fell short for the courier. Still he took what he could use from it, munching on the crisps and savoring the saltiness of them. He reminded himself to have a real meal later. To the left was a staircase. To the right, a hallway, and many rooms to explore in the first floor section.

The first room he came upon was.. sinister, to say the least. Corpses on tables, all headless. Previous victims to the call of the Sierra Madre. Sierra: a long, jagged mountain chain, or code word for the letter S in radio communication. Madre. Mother. The mountain mother. A passing wonder gave thought to if that meant anything, or if the designer simply thought it sounded nice. Most likely, the latter. He noticed a suit draped on a table against the wall joining the doorway; it was slim and dark, meant probably for sneaking about. It didn't look very good for preventing bullets from entering it, though, so Abby decided against switching it out for his own. Then, he read the terminal. Bounds of information from these things, and perhaps he took too long in his pursuit of knowledge, but it was a moot point. An entry titled 'gas leaks' read:

_Admitted 3 workers from Puesta del Sol Switching Station. Exposed to some unidentified airborne toxin from the ventilation system._ The cloud, thought the courier. _Caused severe lung and tissue damage, inhalation isn't the problem, it's absorbed through the skin.  
Researching its effects. The gas, whatever it is, may be building up in vents beneath the town. Asked foreman to look into source before government inspectors do._

Must have become more potent over the years. The next one detailed about chemical suits. Difficult to unlock the clasps once in place... hard to talk and move in... must be the ones the quacks over in the Big Empty had sent over.

Moving on.

He took a peek down the hall, nothing else to note but some stairways. Check out the rest of the first floor, instead. He saw an emitter at the end of the hallway and tried to shoot it, but swore at himself for doing so. It was shielded. At least his collar wasn't going off yet.

“Damn speakers at the end of the hall – red light means they're shielded. Must be a way to shut them off somewhere else.”

“Yeah, wish I'd known that earlier, you twat,” muttered Abby. He ventured down to see just how far he could get without his collar beeping. The answer was a step more than halfway. He didn't need to go further and test himself. He noticed a number of Auto-Docs, one per room. He took a look at them. They weren't fully functioning, it seemed. Able to inject adrenaline and repair broken limbs... but fix addictions, do full surgeries, they could not. A ghostly pain echoed in his foot and elbow.

“What's the worse that could happen,” he asked himself as he stepped inside. The adrenaline would help, too, because, the courier felt, no matter how much sleep he could get it wouldn't be enough. The Auto-Doc indeed found a hairline fracture and pieces of bone floating about in his ankle and set to work. Nothing other than surface damage to the arm, though. He already would feel better soon as he stepped out, but wouldn't use this feeling to encourage recklessness. He wasn't in a position to do so.

Down to the basement he would go, avoiding the patrol upstairs.

 

* * *

 

They had heard most of it. What hadn't been cut out by a weak signal, at least. The pair were distraught at the thought of their dear courier being injured, chased, sickened by the place he had been not-so-kindly escorted to. Arcade instructed Veronica to gather up whatever supplies she could hold from the bunker, along with any notes on the Sierra Madre she could find, while he went looking for a portable radio of some sort. If the Enclave were still around in these parts, finding an eyebot would be as easy as popping his head above ground. Instead, he went to Camp Forlorn Hope, leaving Veronica in the safety of the bunker. He wasn't smart enough in the way of electronics to build one from the radio that existed there, so he had to seek outside help.

The camp was in dire straits, as the name suggested, but in exchange for some medical help, they were willing to give him a radio. He spent an entire two days there, hoping Veronica wouldn't worry for him, but the extent to which people needed help was beyond what a man could do in a single span of sunlight. Doctor Richards, Alex, he insisted Arcade to call him, was the only doctor on sight. Arcade was truly a dense man, or simply too focused on his task to enjoy the flirting that Richards sent his way.

He laid his head down to rest in the camp the second night, promising himself to leave in the morning, radio or no radio. Richards popped his head in with a look of concern.

“Was it something I said?”

“No, it's not, just...”

“There's someone else.”

“You could say that.”

“He must really be something to catch the eye of someone like you.”

“He really is.”

In the morning, Quartermaster Mayes gave him the promised radio, with a passing wish that the doctor could stay. Arcade apologized, saying that he was on a rescue mission. Mayes must have understood the tone of his voice and the look in his eyes when he said that, because he simply wished Arcade good luck and safe travels. Arcade made his way back to the bunker quickly, encouragement in his heart. It hadn't been more than an hour when he slid down the ladder to give Veronica the good news.

She had set up their belongings in a pile by the ladder already. He went to wake her, and after a short breakfast, the two adjourned from the bunker. They set the radio to that station, listening intently to any changes and tuning the radio as they walked. Their plan was still to visit Hidden Valley and ask for any information they could get on Elijah. Veronica was not very keen on going back to the Brotherhood hideout, or bringing an outsider in with her, but it was their only choice unless they wanted to be completely lost and holding out hope that following a signal would lead them to Aberdeen.

The latter had worked for the courier before, so why not them?

Ever forward, faces against the sun, the windswept Mojave welcomed their footsteps.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> whenever I write, I think of Aaron Mahnke's voice because it makes my work seem that much better.  
> most of this chapter was written while listening to the TAZ soundtrack on shuffle. man griff can really write some good battle music.


	13. Four of a Kind

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The gang's all here. Ante up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i lived in a basement for a few years. wonder what that says about me.  
> warning: uhhhhh there be some ghoulish sex goin on in this chapter... enjoy, i guess? also it's been like a RLY long time since i last wrote good smut so it's PRETTY BAD

Basements and attics are usually where the worst of objects are stowed away to be forgotten about. Everything from broken electronics to murder weapons and memories; if it is something bad that no one wants to look at, it's probably in the basement. But boy howdy, was Aberdeen both surprised and relieved when the basement to the medical clinic had no such ghosts haunting its tiny space. Like the police station, the air was damp and cool. He might linger here, he thought, maybe even sleep down here. After all, the area surrounding the medical clinic was clear of ghost people, and there was a hologram that he could set to patrol the first floor in case of any unwelcome visitors. This seemed like a good idea. But what to do about Dog, and Christine? He thought a moment, approaching the terminal on the far side of the room. Send Dog back to the fountain. It's not a long walk. He should be fine. Christine? Well, he hadn't met her yet. If she were human, he might offer to have her rest with him down there. Bit of a cramped space, but it'd make due. Yet, that adrenaline was coursing through him, and he realized that maybe he wouldn't need sleep just for a while. 

The terminal offered him the choice of shutting down the main power. Sweet deal, means no speakers. Emergency backup engaged for the two things that actually mattered in this place. With an air of completion about him, Aberdeen turned to exit the basement. The clinic was... well, empty, aside from the hologram upstairs. He'd managed to sneak around it, check the offices upstairs, but it was just.. empty. Out of curiosity he ended up opening every Auto-Doc. Empty. Empty. Empty. Five of them, empty, except for the one in the last room of the same hallway that would've put his head on the wall. Of course he'd heard the Auto-Doc whirring... because inside that last, malfunctioning one, came stumbling out a human woman. She fell forward, but Abby managed to catch and gently release her.

"Hey, now," he said quietly. "What were you doing in there? Are you..." She looked disoriented, pained. She blinked, then winced, as if the act of blinking caused her pain. There were strange scars across her head, and her mouth was set in almost a permanent grimace. Aberdeen pointed to her scars, which she touched with a gentle hand, then to his own. "Seems we've both been cut up a bit." She didn't say anything. "Who are you?"

Seemed like a dumb question to ask. She looked at him, blinked again, then opened her mouth - but nothing came out. She touched her throat, then traced the scar beneath her chin, and her eyes widened in alarm. 

"...Someone cut your vocal cords." She looked shaken, and glanced back at the Auto-Doc. She recoiled, and opened her mouth - but again, nothing came out. She looked back to him, eyes narrowed and fists clenched. She took a step back, studying him. "Wh-what's the matter?" She opened her mouth again, winced, and frowned. She dragged a finger across her throat in a slow motion, looking more angry than pained. She gently touched her throat again, then her hand traced her collar, and her frown deepened. Her eyes narrow and as she traced the collar, she found the lock to it, and began to press it with her fingers. 

"Don't do that!" He instinctively reached to pull her hand away from it, but she deftly avoided him, eyes widening in surprise and fear. "You'll get us killed - that collar is a bomb." She - Christine, he presumed - looked to his own collar, eyebrow raised. "Let's just say we're in this together," he said through clenched teeth. "I'm sorry for doing that. I want both of us to get out of here alive." 

She frowned, shaking her head. "What do you mean by that?" She shook her head again, drawing a line in the air between the two of them. "I'm not asking us to get married, I'm just asking that we don't die by having our heads accidentally blown off. Call me strange, just thought it'd be a good idea. Look, together we can get out of this." She shook her head, once, and then crossed her arms. 

Stubborn. He got this from God, back at the police station earlier that day, too. It was nearing the end of the day, he was tired, but he couldn't lose face with her. He wanted to reach his hand out, like he usually did, offer it to shake and make peace, but Aberdeen felt it was all too wrong in that instance. Christine couldn't speak, but her actions said everything. 

"What exactly is wrong," he asked, voice calm and quiet. "Don't you want to get out of here?" She frowned, glancing at her collar, then back at him. She made a circle with her hands, putting her hand over her eyes and then squinting. She nodded at him... then lowered her hands from her eyes and drew a slow line between them. "Um. Okay. I'm not good at charades. You're... looking for something else?" She looked him over, studying him again, then shook her head, giving a silent sigh. But... then she nodded at him, raising an eyebrow and nodding at the door. "So you'll come with me?" She nodded. "Oh, thank God. I just want to help, I swear, I fell into this by accident and now I'm trying to just...  _help._ "

Christine started to walk past him, a bit wobbly, with a look of confusion on her face. "Do you want me to help you?" She shook her head, putting a palm out to him, saying, no, please do not touch me. "Okay. Christine, right?" She nodded. "My name is Aberdeen. I hope we can be friends." She passed through the door, apparently knowing the way out. "I should warn you, I have a nightkin standing right outside the door. Don't go picking a fight with him if he spooks you." Christine looked back, giving a, I think I know what I'm doing, look to the courier, a sort of smug glare. 

_We'll be good friends,_ he thought, albeit a bit too hopefully. The Auto-Doc did quite a number on Christine, he judged by not only the obvious scars, but by her uneven walk and the constant rubbing of her arms and neck. She seemed adamant on not resting at all, if her pace said anything, because she wanted to get the hell out of the place that had trapped her for God knows how long.

And then she stopped, looking up to the speaker. She pointed at the collars, frowning.

"It's a decayed speaker," he explained, looking up to it. "Though I deactivated that one. There's still plenty around the Villa, if Elijah's word is anything to take from it." She cocked an eyebrow. "Stay too long near it, and the collars go off." She tapped the collar, then opened and closed her hand very fast. Then... pointed to his Pip-Boy, his collar, and her collar, slowing the motion of her other hand. "Oh,  _that_ I understand. You can interfere with the speaker's detonation frequency, somehow." She started to nod, then stopped. Christine pointed to herself and shook her head. A triangle motion of pointing between the Pip-Boy and collars, with the same, slow pulse with her fingers. "Oh. Does... that work with any other collar?" She frowned, opening her mouth, but then making the motion of turning a dial and pointing at herself. "It's just your frequency." She nodded, emphasizing the Pip-Boy. "And only between us. Great. Well, I like to keep my companions away from danger anyhow, so probably better that way, huh?" She nodded, then gave Aberdeen a look, like saying, "How could it be better that way?" with a shake of her head. "Sorry, it's my personality." She looked like she wanted to groan, but she turned and continued out the clinic.

She yanked the front door open and jumped back, nearly falling over in the process.

"I told you he was out there," said Aberdeen plainly, passing around Christine. "Good boy, Dog. Did anyone come to the door?"

"No, master. Who is master's friend?"

"Christine, this is Dog. You may or may not know him." Her eyes narrowed into a glare of disdain, but she shook her head. "Dog, this is Christine. You'll be protecting her along with me now, okay?"

"Hmm. Will this mean Dog get food?"

"You... I already..." Aberdeen sighed. "Yes, Dog, you'll get more food. Let's go back to the fountain now."

Both the courier and Christine had taken the indoor air for granted. The cloud once again stuck to their skin like nettles, and Christine kept making hissing sounds through her teeth as they walked round the corners and back into the central Villa. 

He knew the facial scars weren't done by the Auto-Doc. Something told him those had been there for as long, if not longer than, his own scars from the Big Empty. In fact, they looked all too similar to his own. He wanted to ask about it, but like most topics, he had tact and knew better. He let Dog and Christine go on ahead to the fountain while he stopped at the vending machine right outside the Medical  District. Popped in the holotapes he'd found, and waited for it to process, then bought a number of items. 

Now that he was in the care of other, living people, he had to buy extra supplies. More food, more stims, and thankfully Med-X. While the irony did not escape him, he took this very fine moment of calm and enjoyed a cigarette. It calmed his nerves, and felt better than the bitter sting of the cloud inside of him. We all have to go one way or another, and this felt like a controlled death. He flicked the butt aside, looking to the two at the fountain. Dog was staring at the hologram, and Christine was sitting on the edge of the fountain itself, staring into an endless red sky. 

"Christine," he called, making her head swing down. "Mind if I ask you a few questions?"

 

* * *

 

There was a nice long chat between them, if 'chat' could be the word used for it. Aberdeen found out how skilled she really was in the ways of weaponry, thinking of her as some sort of cyber-ninja. That's probably why she shaves her head; makes her move faster. She did know that the way out of the Villa was deadly, and that Elijah wasn't playing games. She would stay here, even if they were all able to escape, hunting Elijah.

"You remind me a lot of Veronica," he said with a chuckle. Her mouth went agape at the sound of her name. "You know her, don't you? His protege. She was after him, too. Not nearly as good at tracking him down as you've managed to be, though. I know those scars. You followed him into the Big Empty. They tried to lobotomize you, used electroshock therapy on you. That's why you can't write... isn't it?" She nodded. "But you escaped. Me, too. Except they did a lot worse to me. Ended up blowing up every last one of them, Mobius included. I think it's better that way. Maybe I can help you end Elijah, here, once and for all, eh?"

She smiled.  _I hope so,_ her face said.

 

* * *

 

He left them in the fountain area for the time being. If Christine got tired, he instructed her to find shelter indoors, and to take Dog with her if she were to leave the fountain. He knew that there was a risk to be taken in wandering out on his own, alone, for Dean, but he didn't want to pass that risk to Christine and Dog. He left Christine the shotgun, a few rounds, some food and medical supplies, and promised he'd be back soon.

Like the Medical District, the Residential District was right around the corner from the fountain. Elijah came through on the Pip-Boy as he entered the area, warning the courier against detonators. What Six didn't know, though, was that he wasn't exactly talking about the collar, but mines. The damn things were everywhere. He could recognize a mine from a mile away, making them easy enough to deactivate and even pocket two or three of them. Even more were pressure plates, tripwires, and rigged shotguns - this Dean fellow was certainly the type to keep himself safe. And for good reason, too. If he had been trapped here, Abby would have ensured his security with traps like this. 

There were large pockets - no, bags - of cloud, covering entire squares of the residential district. It seemed to collect itself just in the center of the squares, making it easily avoidable enough. Just annoying, having to traverse up and down stairwells, ducking beneath archways, and holding his breath whenever he did have to pass through wisps of it, though it would embed itself into him regardless. At one point, he had to drop down, and he did so carefully, hanging from the ledge and spotting a grenade bouquet on the corner. What a prize! He snapped it off its perch and dropped down. Six grenades, very nice. Maybe a bit overkill, Dean, but nice. 

Faint sounds of a radio... a familiar voice. Sinatra, maybe? And how the hell was a radio working without setting his collar to explode? He followed the noise up through the interior of a building.

"That tourist crosses me, they'll regret it. Even if they don't, they still might," he heard a voice from above him. 

"Oh, don't worry, you won't get any trouble from lil' old me..." The final set of stairs led around a corner to a simple room. Two chairs, a lit lamp, and the smell of a cigarette. In one of the chairs sat someone, a ghoul, by the looks of it. They turned their head at the sound of the courier's approach, as quiet as he was.

"Well now, it's nice to have some company." The same voice that had just murmured a vague threat. That was Dean, all right. "Come now, have a seat. We'll have a little chat." He sounded pleasant enough, despite the rudeness on the radio. A ruse that dearly daft Courier Six had fly right over his pretty little head. He did take a seat, making an audible sigh. It felt... so damn good to sit down, finally. The ghoul was wearing a suit and a pair of sunglasses, looking actually fairly dapper for a disastrous time and place. There was a giant hole in the wall that stared out over the square. Aberdeen couldn't help but wonder if the ghoul had made it himself to keep an eye out on the deadly residents that called this hell their home. It was oddly beautiful to look at the swirls of toxic cloud polluting the sky. It had become noticeably darker, meaning the sun had probably set. The time on his Pip-Boy confirmed this; it was technically past midnight. There were still lights that got sucked into the cloud from the Villa itself, creating an everlasting glow.

The courier pulled out his own cigarettes and lit one to share this moment with Dean. "Cheers, mate."

"The Sierra Madre... Mm, beauty, isn't she. She the one who invited you here?"

"I wouldn't say invited so much as dragged by force."

"Well," Dean sat back in his chair, "dragged or not... don't get too comfortable there," he gestured chin at Six. "No matter how uncomfortable that chair gets, the cushion's just for show."

Aberdeen blinked. "And here I thought we were going to have a pleasant conversation." He took a drag of the cigarette. "Better be a shaped charge, or you'll kill both of us."

"Ahaha," Dean chuckled, lighting another cigarette. Chain smoker. "Sounds like someone's done some blue collar construction work, your ma must be proud." He exhaled a cloud of smoke, his tone shifting. "Still... Get up without my permission, I'll blast your ass so far through your head, it'll turn the moon cherry pie red."

"You won't even buy me dinner first? How rude." Abby smirked. "You and that deranged old man seem to have an affinity for anything that blows up... you know that bow tie he's fashioned around your neck'll explode, too, right? That is if mine, or Christine's, or Dog's goes off. Any one of us goes, and we'll all be over the moon."

"Well, now." He seemed to consider this for a long moment. His voice was so... delicious to Aberdeen's ears. He could listen to Dean talk all day, even if he was being a manipulative ass. "Just because I work in entertainment doesn't mean I'm a moron. I know I'm a part of this somehow. I want out of this contract." His voice turned rueful. "And  _you're_ wearing a collar, so I trust you a  _little_ more than the old guy. He's more controlling than I'd like." Abby snorted at that. "Something funny?"

"No, no," he lied, sensing that Dean was the controlling type. "Continue, please, I'm all ears."

"That's what I've missed - a rapt audience. Listen to what I have to say,  _my_ end of the bargain, eh?"

"I'll cooperate. Anything to get that old fuck irritated. What do you want?" 

"Good, good!" His voice was much friendlier, a real smile on his face. "Then we're in business. I may be a betting man, but I like it when the odds are in our favor. If you're here with who I think, then I'd rather have you on my side than his, and by the sounds of it? An... ace in the hole. You want to live. I want what's in the Madre. Real simple."

"I want nothing to do with that... 'treasure'," he sucked in a hard draw. "It's starting to make sense, now that I've met you."

Dean laughed again, "All right, all right... looks like marriage finally caught me." The ghoul leaned towards Aberdeen, reaching a hand to the chair, and with the hit of a switch, something seemed to deflate underneath him. "I'm listening... partner. What's next, if we're death-til-we-part?"

"Right now? Find a spot for me to go the fuck to sleep."

"I've a bed right there," he jerked a thumb at it, "though you fall asleep in that, you might find yourself in the eternal sleep. Doesn't seem very fitting, considering our circumstances."

"No, thank you. Plenty of smaller residences I had to go through with two doors. One of those, maybe, and perhaps a handsome ghoul can help me set up traps in case one of the fair residents decides to come knocking on our boudoir?" 

"Taking the flirtatious route, are we?" Dean pulled his sunglasses down enough to wink at the courier. "My dear, only the Madre has my heart. But I understand you humans have certain... needs, such as sleep, and food. Let's strike up the band and get going, then."

"Follow me."

 

* * *

 

 

Even if the Sierra Madre lay in an area far from the Mojave, it didn't make its nights any less warm and sultry. It was equally hot, which is probably why Christine wore the bare essentials. But this isn't about her, right now. 

It was a small room, but it had two working, closed doors, barricaded and trapped. It had a bed, well, a mattress, that had fallen through the rotten remains of a frame, and a hot plate on a table next to a fridge. It was someone's apartment, way back when, but tonight it was claimed by two heavily drunken, nicotine-ridden men. After finding said spot Dean and Abby shared a small meal and a few shots of scotch "to relax." That turned into finishing the bottle, Dean pulling another bottle of something that they later found out to be vodka from the fridge and them finishing  _that_ , and as the night grew on the heat really sank in. They practically hotboxed themselves with the constant chain-smoking of shared cigarettes.

And what does someone do when they are very hot, and very drunk? Usually, they get undressed. Aberdeen was one to normally be a bit more reserved about this, but he threw his Pip-Boy, armor, and clothing - all but his underwear - into a corner and sprawled spread-eagle on the mattress, smoking and sighing at how good it felt. Dean made some smart-ass comment about it; neither of them could remember what it was, but it sent them into fits of laughter. When the courier didn't realize it, Dean himself had also removed his clothes. Even ghouls can get warm, guessed Aberdeen.

What happened in there started out as some light teasing. 

"Get some meat on your bones," Abby laughed at the thin frame of the ghoul.

"Maybe you can provide me with some." Dean sidled up beside him, raking a hand tenderly up the torso of his companion. Abby muttered a curse, turning on his side to pull Dean closer. Their heads were swimming, high on a fabricated ecstasy. When it was their lips met was uncertain, as many things were in this night. The courier could remember how they felt on his own human lips, scarred and dry, not cracking like his. Dean was hungry for this, hands wandering already too closely to the other man's behind, reaching for a treasure that he could actually have for himself.

Legs had been entwined. Abby's hands were far too careful for Dean's liking. Oh, go ahead, grab me, he would say. Don't be afraid to leave marks. It's not like anything would show. Aberdeen granted the ghoul the same permission, and scratches and bruises and hickeys soon started to appear on each of the men's bodies. It was messy in their drunken stupor, clumsy, awkward. Dean had never really worn any form of underwear in these last few decades; what point was there? So he found it almost humorous when Abby began to hump him through is own and insisted the man just fuck him already. 

"Oh no, that's not how I work," he said breathlessly. "You got a smart mouth on you. You better put it to use."

"Are you asking me to give you a blowjob?" Dean was acting coy, rubbing the courier's cock over his underwear.

"I ain't askin'."

"Hmm," he hummed, licking his lips. "Fair enough, I suppose." Controlling type, his _ass_. Dean Domnio was well and truly a pushover in the bedroom. He shoved Abby's shoulder down, forcing him onto his back, and headed south. There was a short fumble of the final layer of clothing being removed. Dean reached his hands underneath Abby, pulling his face into his groin. His cock was stiff, and twitched when Dean placed his mouth at the base. A breath escaped Abby's mouth. The ghoul had experience with this: starting by taking in the flavor of his balls, sucking oh so gently, fingers prying his ass cheeks apart. A tiny whine of a plead. Dean slid his left hand smoothly enough to get a finger wet with his saliva and ran his tongue up the length of the courier's member. His index finger teasing the entrance, careful lips pulling his foreskin down from the tip. He licked the small amount of precum off before, in one swift movement, taking Aberdeen's entire length into his mouth and pushing his finger into him. Aberdeen arched into him, his own hands atop the ghoul's head, a moan coming from him that could have woken the dead. 

"Ffffuuu-uhoooh, hoooly-" Fragments of words, curses, sputtering from his mouth as Dean let the man move his cock in and out his mouth. Ghouls don't really have gag reflexes, and thus, make the perfect face-fucking machines. Dean only teased his finger inside the man, enjoying the feeling and flavor of his erection on his tongue and in his throat. Abby held the ghoul's head in place, slowing - he didn't want to cum, not yet. It would be all too easy if he kept at this pace. Wordlessly, Dean pulled his head back - with Abby's release - and shifted upwards. 

"No," said Abby. "Get on your knees." Dean did as he was told and in an instant, his face was pushed into the mattress, the pain of the man's cock being forced inside him. He didn't complain. It was a great pain, and the groan of pleasure from Aberdeen made it quite clear. "You like that?" The courier reached around to grasp the ghoul's own member. "You want more, mm?"

"Please," Dean begged in a whisper. The courier pulled back a little, then shoved his entire length in, hand squeezing around Dean's cock. Slow movements increased gradually, pumps of the hand matching in rhythm. Dean pressed his hips, ass upwards to allow Abby to fuck him as hard as possible. His fingers were digging into the mattress, weak pants and moans escaping into the fabric. He would feel his finale coming up soon after the courier had entered him, coming with a shudder and ass tightening around the other man's cock. Aberdeen was moving with furious intent, sweating, panting, feeling the sticky cum from the ghoul on his hand. He pumped it all out, unsatisfied with anything less, then leaned up a bit, taking both hips in hand, and drilling into him. Dean let out a cry, his body pounding against the mattress. Each thrust brought the courier closer to his limit, and at the end Dean could feel it twitching, and it was rammed in to the base, Aberdeen letting out a staggered gasp. He didn't linger, pulling out while he was still coming, the semen dripping out the ghoul's ass. He didn't care,  _they_ didn't care. The short time that had passed had sobered them up enough to realize what they'd done, but not enough to fill them with any regret. In the aftermath of all that the Great War had brought on, intimacy was rarely found. 

They shared one last cigarette before passing out in the early hours of the morning.

 

* * *

 

 

Cleanup was a bit of a bitch, as was gathering the remainder of the traps that had been lain. Dean bitched about how sore his knees felt, and not in the funny, cute way, but in the way that really pissed Aberdeen off. It didn't help that his head pounded and his stomach was flipping over. He grabbed for a Med-X to relieve himself of the pain and push him back to the village, his pissy partner in tow. 

"There  _is_ a shortcut, you know," he said with an air of arrogance. "It's through the cloud - but if I'm with you, I can help you through it. Lived here long enough to get used to it in doses."

"Mmhm. You know where it came from, then?"

"No, not a clue. It wasn't always here. It grew, over time, even without cars. The residents of this place... it did something to them. You should hope it doesn't happen to you, as well."

"I don't plan on sticking around long enough to find out." 

It was already mid-afternoon, nearly evening. The combination of alcohol and falling asleep at nearly two in the morning made for a late awakening. Aberdeen was slow-going, and purposefully moved slower when Dean made the comment of how the Sierra Madre wasn't getting any younger. When they arrived at the fountain, they saw a scene of Christine pacing back and forth. She jogged over to them, a worried expression on her face.

"Sorry, Christine. Took longer than anticipated. We'll be getting a move on soon enough." She looked around Abby to give a quizzical look to Dean. She pointed at his collar and then to Abby. "Yeah, he's one of the victims, as well. We'll find out what part he plays as soon as we get that old bastard talking." 

"Oh, not even going to introduce us, are you? The name's Dean, darling." Christine simply glared at the old ghoul. "The silent type, eh? Don't worry, I'll make you open up... sooner or later." Her expression changed to that of shock and disgust. Even Aberdeen turned to give Dean a glare.

"Leave her alone, Dean."

"Alright, alright, whatever you say," he said coldly. Aberdeen gave an apologetic look to Christine, then went up to the fountain. A small panel popped up from the tiles, casting the image of Elijah over the top tier of the fountain.

"Well, we're here. What's your game, Elijah?"

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i think the next update might be a while? tuesday/wednesday i'm doing some travelling - i'll bring my laptop with me, but i might not be able to get a chapter out. then I'm working eight days in a row, then immediately doing more travelling and won't be able to bring my laptop with me then. but i'll make it an extra large chapter, maybe 10-15k words, to make up for it. oh boy i'm gonna have a lot to do  
> also, as far as the timeline of this goes: so, technically, where veronica and arcade are is one and a half-two days ahead of this chapter. at the end of this chapter, it will be, in abby's time, the evening before they have left for hidden valley. I have a physical location for the sierra madre based off the irl sierra madre, so i know about how long it takes to walk there. it will come together and make sense eventually.


	14. Auri Sacra Fames

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And lo, in the tower above, the bell rang out. A courier shall deliver the souls of the ghosts to God. Beati qui ambulant lege Domini!  
> The bell tolls for thee, Courier Six. And the mob chants your name.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> prepare for a lot of nonsense i've been awake for four days straight none of this will make any sense also can someone come give me a massage
> 
> also enjoy the snippets of what vero and arc are up to  
> edit 9/17: i got some sleep sup y'all

"Good! Well done... now, for the festivities, and your parts in all this. The owner of the Sierra Madre, for whatever reason, keyed the Grand Opening to the Gala Event itself. It needs to be fired off in order for the casino doors to open. As I've discovered, one person can't do it."

_Yeah, because before the war, there were tons of people who were tasked with each part of the opening. Duh._

"So, get your team into position indicated on your Pip-Boy, then trigger it properly. You're  _so close_ now, don't let me down."

"I heard that last night," Aberdeen muttered under his breath. "God, you turn everything into a joke," followed quieter.

"Otherwise, I'll have to rely on the next team."

"Yeah. Like I care about the 'next team'." Complete with air quotes. "That's just a veiled threat, 'don't let me down... or I'll blow your head off', right?" His brows furrowed. Christine elbowed him with a worried look. "Sorry, I'm really irked. What is this Gala Event anyway?"

"Are you  _serious_?" Dean asked, flabbergasted. The two gave him a look that needed no words to describe.

Dog, on the other hand, was staring open-mouthed...  _drooling_... at the hologram.

"A display of lights, fireworks... music in the streets, a Pre-War festival to mark the casino's opening. The bombs struck first. It is of no consequence, only firing the event is - get the three in position, then travel to  _your_ position in Salida del Sol and trigger the Gala. After that, the real work begins."

"The real work?" The courier scoffed. "What was this, a warm-up?"

"Perhaps you think this is a simple robbery. A cheap casino heist. No. This is a heist of the centuries. We're not plundering the Sierra Madre - we're plundering history, taking from the Old World itself. It won't let its secrets go easily...  not without a fight. I wouldn't expect anything less."

"A fight?... The residents. The security..." He turned to look at the three faces behind him. He sighed with a heavy heart. "We'll get going, then."

"I'd suggest taking the FEV reject to his position first... although you may need his brutality and strength elsewhere first. As easy as the Villa was to navigate... the outlying areas of the villa are far more dangerous, thicker with the ghost people, traps, and toxins. Use your team as I use you... listen to your collar, watch where you step. You're no use to me dead." 

Before Aberdeen could say any more snarky remarks, the vision of Elijah fizzed out with a blip. He took a hand and dragged it down his face... realizing his helmet had been left behind in his drunken escapade the night before. 

"Oh, God damn it."

 

* * *

 

 

Click. Click. Click.

"Stop that, it won't make the fact that you're out of ammo any different," hissed Veronica. She threw Arcade the bag that she'd been toting around, and he hastily dug through it. Just over the hill was a colony of radscorpions, surging out of their nest. Wind whipped up the sand and dirt, blurring their vision, making the situation that much worse. "Keep it, I'm jumping in there."

"Vero-" She had already hefted herself up over the hill and disappeared into the storm with a rebel yell.

 

* * *

 

 

"Right, let's have a look at this. Dog... Is going to the switching station to Salida del Sol. Seems like the switch there is stuck. Dean to the rooftop in... Puesta del Sol. Some wires he's gotta put back together." Dean scoffed. Christine tugged his arm, pointing to herself. "We'll worry about you last, okay?" Aberdeen lowered his voice to a whisper, "You're the most valuable and sane one out of us all here. I want to make sure you're safest." 

She didn't know how to feel about that.

"Dog, do you want to go with master now?"

"Where are you taking Dog? Dog doesn't want to leave, heard Master... Saw Master in sky. And when Master not there... woman at fountain! She is made of lines and light, want to watch."

"Dog, do you know  _why_ you have to go to this place?" The nightkin put an oddly contemplative look on his face.

"Hard to pull things...?" Aberdeen nodded. "Dog has to pull very, very hard to... are we going there?" Another, more enthusiastic nod. "Dog not want to stay and pull things... hard to do... and cage there." His face fell, nod turning to shake. 

"N...no, Dog, you  _must_ come with me. Do you not understand? I'll... I'll get you  _lots_ of food!" The nightkin remained adamant, shaking his head, sounding frightened.

"Dog not go. Dog not want in cage again, with no food. When Dog goes to cage... voice wakes up!" His fists clenched. "Other voice try keep Dog locked away... Keep Dog away from food. Master-" he looked with sudden intensity to the courier, "-Master make voice go away!"

"Dog..."

"Are we going to do this all damn day?!" Dean spat, stomping over to the nightkin. "Listen you-"

"Hey!"

"-We  _all_ want to get into the Sierra Madre," the ghoul jabbed a finger into Dog's chest. "I'm not going to be held back because some abomination decided he was going to hide with his tail between his legs."

"Dean, I  _swear to God-"_ Christine put herself between the two, pushing Dean backwards. He stumbled a few steps, looking to her with intense anger, but then he cracked a smirk.

"Girl's got some fight in her, eh?" He chuckled, straightening himself out. Christine was glowering, hand reaching around to the shotgun on her back. "Ah, ah, wouldn't do that if I were you. Remember that good old wedding band 'round all our necks? Wouldn't want our dear old friends here - yourself included - having  _their_ brains splattered all about the place, would you?"

She opened her mouth, teeth set hard, as if she were snarling, then - spat in his direction. Dean only chuckled again.

"You know what? Dean." The courier turned to him with a malicious grin on his face, snapping his fingers. "Come now, let's get you away from these and prevent any more arguments, mm?"

"Oh, you just want me for yourself, don't you? I understand... not everyone can be me." He flashed a mostly toothless grin. Turning back to Christine and Dog, he mimed the tipping of a hat. "I bid you both adieu... and see you in the Madre."

"You're insufferable," muttered Aberdeen. 

It seemed he would do this in the opposite order that he'd gathered them: Dean, Christine, Dog. He ensured Christine and Dog would be fine on their own - but despite her hatred towards the ghoul already, she was insistent on coming. She kept emphasizing her collar and his. What if there are speakers? What if there was a mob of ghost people? She wanted to make herself useful. If, and  _when_ Dean began to make some awful comments, Six promised he'd let her shoot him. Only in the foot, though. 

He may have slept with him but man, was that a bad decision. One right after another. Dean was a foul-mouthed, inconsiderate, uncaring sonofabitch. Through his mannerisms and words, he proved to be entirely useless. Hiding, running away from the two, TWO, ghost people they encountered after his retrieval, weakly pointing his pistol at them, after managing to keep them at bay for decades? Weak. Pathetic. And he wasn't even that good of a lay, either. Heaps of disappointment dressed in a suit. The ghoul lit a cigarette and shrugged on forward.

"Well, come on, we haven't got all day."

 

* * *

 

 

"I thought it was right here!" She shouted over the storm. Arcade cupped his ears.

"What?!"

"I SAID I THOUGHT IT WAS RIGHT HERE!"

"WHAT?!"

Veronica flipped him the bird and tugged on the rope that attached the two. The storm had started as normal, but now it was impossible to see more than two feet in front of you. The sand on one's skin was like glass. Arcade bumbled onwards, unable to hear, or see, anything over the sand storm, praying (in the place of Aberdeen) that they would soon arrive at the bunker.

 

* * *

 

 

There is safety in numbers - that is, if your numbers aren't all odd and hate each other. If Dean weren't in the picture, it'd look like a happy family. Family can be lots of things, and sometimes, that includes a nightkin whose name is Dog and not an actual dog, a mute scarred woman, and two assholes that are assholes for wildly different reasons. Aberdeen  _really_ didn't want to drag them around here, there, and everywhere. Three? A crowd. Four? Oh,  _fuck_ no. He could only  _wish_ that Arcade and Veronica were here - in a weird sense, not like, he wishes they were here here, but if he could choose, they would - you know what? Nevermind, that's not making any sense. There's no postcards in the Sierra Madre that he could send saying "Having a great time, wish you were here instead of these idiots who are going to get me killed." Doesn't quite have the same ring to it as "Miss you lots."

"Damn idiot," Dean muttered as the group crowded together through the narrow passageways of the Villa. "That Gala Event... Oh, it'll light up the casino, light up the sky... set the speakers in the Villa to play beautiful, soothing music.  And when I say soothing music-"

"Yeah, yeah, those speakers will kill us all."

"Think air raid sirens. That means it'll wake up everything in town like a hornet's nest." He spotted the confused look on Aberdeen's face. "Not sure what a hornet is? Forget it. Basically, trouble."

"Sounds lovely."

Conversation ended there, much to everyone's relief. The Puesta del Sol north entrance was not too far from where the medical district was. The south entrance was unacceptable, it seemed. As they pushed through the double doors, their visions were filled with red. The cloud was much denser above them, dying everything from the stones, plaster, and ruined paths redder than an October sunset. 

"Let's head through the hole in the wall there," Dean said in a muted whisper, already crouching on his bad knees, "if we go backstage, we'll avoid the locals." No affirmation needed, just head up through the wall. The... unfortunate thing about safety in numbers also means that there is a lot of attention drawn to large groups, and that's just what happened. 

Two of them, staggering through the archway, screaming out. Bear trap fist on one, throwing spear for the other. Dog rushed in, eager for a meal.

"Damn you, I can't get a shot in if you do that!" Aberdeen groaned and reached for the holorifle. Dean was, well, he'd gone and hidden behind something, and Christine was right by the courier's side.  _Well, at least I have two competent people on my side._ It was over rather quickly. Abby had taken shot at the one with the throwing spear's head, but it didn't kill it. The shot to its legs with the shotgun, courtesy of Christine, did. And Dog? Well. He uh. Bit. The other one's head off. Just straight up,  _munch_. The two recoiled in disgust and hastily made way to inside the small shelter to not pay attention to it.

Christine blinked and pointed to the wall, urging Aberdeen backwards. 

"What, what is-?" Then he heard it, after the sound of motion quieted down. A radio. Of course. "It's... coming from upstairs, actually. Let's-" He was interrupted by the sound of a pistol going off in his ear. He jumped, looking over, seeing Dean actually  _doing something for once_ and aiming a pistol up over the edge of a counter. Another head turn spotted a ghost person. Because of course this route would be no fucking different than any other route. 

This place. Is infuriating.

"Hey," Six poked Christine with an elbow, "think you can find a way up to the rooftops? Might be able to avoid all the..." and, she was off. It only took her a minute or two before she was throwing stones down at them from above. Dog wouldn't be able to fit up there, or he could, but just barely. They felt it was a better idea to have him stay there. Keep any ghost people from coming in... or from leaving. Kill everything in sight that isn't  _us_ , and you can eat everything you'd like... Dangle a steak in front of a dog, and he'll bite. Wasn't hard to convince him. Though where Christine had to go was also in this area. sorta... kill two birds with one stone. Though, the courier didn't like the idea of that floating in his head. What else was he to do? He couldn't get out of this without putting them all through something potentially traumatizing, though, the initial onset of this entire happenstance was traumatic enough. The three dropped down from atop the higher up roof and followed the arrows. 

Left there by previous victims. And crosses, now, by Aberdeen. These crosses bear hope, hope of returning. From the rooftops, there was the opportunity to pick off the ghost people below, one by one. A trio of them further along the inside of the winding rooftop. Aberdeen learned something, once, though he can't remember from where. Keep your right hand on the wall of the maze, and you'll find your way to the center. Well, there was some truth to that. They certainly found the 'center'... where Elijah's voice breathed to life on the Pip-Boy.

"There, the switching station. That's where you'll bring the mute."

"She has a name," he grumbled. Dean chuckled behind them. The rooftop here didn't connect, not quite, to the slanted tiles on an archway above a set of stairs. There, a misty fog of condensed cloud hung low. Beyond it, a light, absorbed into the darkness. "Christine, do you want to wait to be dropped off here?" She nodded her head, yes, I'd like to wait, fervently. "Okay. Let's get going then."

"Why does  _she_ get an option of being the last to go? What is this, kindergarten?"

"First of all, because I actually give a crap about her. Second of all, what the hell is a kindergarten?"

"Gave a crap about me last night," the ghoul sneered. Christine's mouth opened in an expression of shock and disbelief, but Aberdeen just shook his head at her. Dean's voice might be smooth, and he's certainly a charmer but he was nothing short of despicable, selfish, and a downright dick. "Of course you wouldn't know what a kindergarten is. Nevermind, let's just go before this cloud dyes our skins red."

They did, in fact, have to drop off the roof at some point anyway. Aberdeen first, catching Christine, and letting Dean do his own thing. "Real charmer, you are," commented Dean. 

"For you? Anything. Righty, this... is the door to Puesta del Sol south." Six patted the door, almost affectionately, because he couldn't wait to get rid of Dean. 

"Let's get this show on the road, then. I am  _all_ about keeping low in this section of town... so let's see about creeping by the locals, all right?"

"No, I planned on rushing right in."

No need for doing that - there was already a mob waiting for them right on the other side of the door. Maybe it was... a bad idea to leave Dog behind. Three ought to do the job! Right? Right. But boy would it eat into their ammo, and their stims. Christine took a knife spear to the leg - thankfully, it didn't embed itself, only grazing her, but still managed to cut a deep wound into her. She would walk with even worse of a limp now. She bit through the pain of it, refusing any Med-X. More, though, appeared on the rooftops. Nowhere was safe. Above, ahead, and underneath them, deep in the underground, a metropolis of hands pawing for an escape to the surface. All it would take was the Gala event to let them loose. If this was what was in store for them, Aberdeen wasn't so sure that he, or any of them, could survive the onslaught. He invested in taking some spears with him. He's not very good at throwing, but it'd be worth it in case he needed to take pot shots at them from above.

They lurked around corners, breathing heavy, indications of what remained of their life. The group stuck low to the ground, hushing Dean's complaints, moving slow. Aberdeen's head throbbed. Lack of proper food, water, and sleep along with the remainder of a hangover was doing his body no good. Christine was worse for wear, as well, unbeknownst to Abby. She hadn't slept at all. She couldn't. Any time her eyes closed... and darkness sank in... she would awaken again, limbs paralyzed in fear, mouth open in a silent scream. 

There was a stairwell that led to a pool of cloud. No, they wouldn't go that way, not unless they absolutely had to, even with the protection of the child of the cloud itself, Dean Domino. Forward, a radio. There are many paths here, taking the safest route is the best way. Best to avoid it until later. On the left, a small shop, with a vending machine, and then the continuing path leading further inwards. There were.. two ghost people here. Far enough away to leave them alone, if they stayed where they were. Two shots to the heads of the shambling figures and pop they went.

"My Pip-Boy says you need to be goin right past that cloud, upstairs, by my reckoning," Aberdeen broke the tense silence.

"Your reckoning will get me killed. Lead me up there or I'm not going anywhere at all." The ghoul crossed his arms, like a child harrumphing at their parent. Six scoffed.

"Fine. Christine, wait here." Her eyes widened in concern. "It's safer than having you go through that." She shook her head, eyebrows furrowed and hand splayed out in a gesture that asked, well, what about you? "I can handle it." He could tell by the next expression she made that she was sick of men and just wanted him to get on with it. "Up we go, Dean."

The cloud was harsh. He'd been close to the pockets of them before, tendrils reaching out to caress his face and leave a singe of a lover's bite. This was taking a dip in an acid bath, drenching him through his armor.

"It's like a ballroom," Dean explained, weaving and bobbing his way through the cloud. "Even in the concentrated pockets, you can find spots where you can slip through. Take up your partner-" He lifted his arms to gesture a dancing pose, "-and dance through the crowd." Aberdeen studied his movements, the sweeps of his legs, the dips and twirls. He was not nearly as dexterous, and ended up falling through a curtain of it. Dean's lips curled with an amused laugh at the courier's misfortune, but he simply told him to sod off and to get up the damn stairs.

"You're at the ghoul's Gala area. Now, make him stay." Elijah's words were sweet and swift on the Pip-Boy. 

"You're not helping."

"So... this is where I'm supposed to put on the show? Played better venues than this," he gestured to the sparking wires, "let me tell you." He wandered over to look into it. "Looks... like it's tied to the sound system in the Villa, except for that snipped section there. So... what, I stand here, hold the two ends in my hands, and tap them together like cymbals?"

"Like one of those monkey toys." Aberdeen, with a blank look on his face, imitated the cymbal-banging monkeys. Dean was unamused. "Guess that's the plan. You gonna be able to do it safely?"

"Safely? What, after your sweet-and-ruthless talk when we first met, now you care about my safety? Right."

"Could just jab both wires into you, close the circuit that way." The courier raised an eyebrow, hands moving to his hips. Dean grimaced at the thought. "Yeah, take the alternative, buddy."

"Look, I strike up the speaker system, there's going to be ghosts all over this place." His arms splayed out in a circle around him. "Any change in the sounds around here... the ghost people are not big on talking, they are big on listening. Hunting.  _Killing_. More vicious than music critics, trust me."

"...Right," Abby nodded, not really understanding what he meant by that last sentence. He smacked his lips together in contemplation. "And... there's more everywhere else around here... So clearing them out won't do."

"The man has brains, fancy that." Dean leaned against the door frame, lighting a cigarette. 

"Surprisingly so, after two bullets and having it removed once or twice." Dean raised an eyebrow to that. "Don't ask. Anyway, there's still holograms that work in the Villa. If I find a way to switch some on that cover the area..." He rolled his wrist to give Dean the hint to finish the thought.

"Well... yeah, if the hologram systems still work, that'd do the trick." He nodded, radiation-burnt lips pursing to take an inhale. He exhaled, saying, "okay. Alright. You call up some of those Old World stiffs. That'd be an audience I wouldn't mind having below."

"Guessing there are some nearby, then?"

"You guess correctly. I just don't remember how you switch them on. I leave it up to you,  mister magic." He lowered his sunglasses to wink with the cigarette hanging in his mouth. Insincere, like the rest of his personality. 

"Wait here while I go take care of that."

"Wouldn't have it any other way."

 

* * *

 

 

Two bodies, collapsed on the metal ground of a long-abandoned shelter. Two bodies, panting, sweating, enjoying the feeling of cold steel on their faces. Two bodies... who are clearly in the wrong place.

Two voices that can be heard outside that shelter, in the blustering winds, screaming one, long word. I'll leave that word to the imagination.

 

* * *

 

 

"Okay. Okay, I'll do that, I can probably just  _guess_ where they are," Aberdeen muttered, walking over to the other door on the rooftop. "Some area filled with poison aaannd things that want to kill me aaaaaaaaaand radios that turn my head into a poor attempt at taxidermy for the world's shittiest vacation spot."

"I can hear you," Dean called after him.

"I don't care," he called back.

What a lovely relationship they have! Warms the heart. For someone who's survived an awfully long time in this neighborhood, Dean had a way with his words that made sure he'd be really really good at being killed one day.

What convenience! What luck! Like a poorly written plot device, a terminal in the floor below sat, simply waiting for its user to come back to it and turn back on the holograms. Sure, Aberdeen wasn't the original user, and suuuuuuure these were extraneous circumstances, but hey, a job's a job and the terminal would like it. 

That was one of them. Christine jumped at the sudden blue light behind her, and she ducked behind a wall. Aberdeen, on the roof above, peeked down at her.

"Sorry, Christine," she jumped again at his voice. "Um, it's not gonna hurt you so you can just wait there... Better yet, wait for me in that shop we passed by?" She glowered at him, picking up and throwing a rock at his shin before stomping off. "Hey!" 

Well, whatever. Christine's annoyance at him was well deserved. He edged along the rooftop and slipped through the space of the broken balcony to continue around it. Looking around the immediate vicinity would be faster than searching the entire area of Puesta del Sol south. And no need to loop back around to find a way up on the roof, that'd be silly and pointless! Lucky for him, the other terminal was just across the plaza through a hole in the wall. This was the least of his difficulties. Now... to let Dean know it was safe for him to get into position. There wasn't anything of interest in the shop below, so Aberdeen looped back up and around. 

"Your eyes still work, old man?"

"You powered them both up! Well.. yeah, that's pretty good protection. Sure worked at the fountain." Then, he added in a softer voice, "Vera kept the ghost people away." He cleared his throat. "But, uh... how do I know the power won't suddenly go out? And... I don't know, this still sounds risky to me.  _For_ me," he clarified. 

"Vera's stayed powered up since the bombs fell. Couple of other holograms have too, and speakers, et cetera. Those will, too." 

"Well... yeah. You got a point. All right, look, if the holograms are here to keep me company, then... I don't mind staying here for a while. But listen... when this thing goes off, try and get into the Sierra Madre without me? You'll wish you hadn't. And don't think I'll let you get off easy for that old man comment." 

"Don't miss me too much," he said nonchalantly, making his way down to Christine. It had become a ghost town - no pun intended - with those security holograms about. "Hey, Christine? Christine?" He peered into the shop. She was kneeling down, looking through the old cabinets beneath the counter. "Anything good?" She raised her hand in success - two more grenades to add to their six. "Awesome. Let's get going to your spot, alright?"

They'd go back the way they came. No sense in finding another way back, considering there were unknown dangers abound, lurking just around one unseen corner. 

"You look like you want to say something."

She made a silent sigh, shaking her head. That sigh turned into a big, long yawn. "Oh, just tired then. Maybe we can find a spot to rest?" She shook her head again, no, even if her eyes were blinking slowly and her feet were dragging. "Christine..." 

She made a lot of slow gestures. Pointing to her eyes, then collar. Pressing her hands together and leaning her head on them, indicating sleep... then suddenly standing straight and shivering, her arms wrapped around her, head shaking, no, no, no, over and over. When she was done, she shrugged and made a frown.

"You can't sleep because it gives you... nightmares... No. Night terrors - shell shock." She made a single, sad nod. "I... have issues like that, too. It's why I indulge in the wonderful world of drugs... smoking calms my mind, alcohol makes me forget... haven't done much anything stronger, though. Thought about it. Kinda glad I didn't... I think Arcade would hate me if I did." 

She raised an eyebrow at him,  _who?_ "Ah, my... friend. Companion, before I came here. We actually got into an argument right before..." Aberdeen trailed off. They had arrived at the switching station, his hand lingering on the door handle. "I was so stupid."

When touch-starved, the brain of a man can go weak. Any touch, any word of even promising companionship, can turn him ravenous. Courier Six went hunting for the companionship to feel a little less lonely, missing out on what he already had with him. Christine put a reassuring hand on his shoulder.

"...Thanks. You ready?" She nodded.

And in they went. "Why do you think he wants you here, anyway?" She frowned, then made a motion as if typing at keys... then pointed at him, raising her left wrist and pantomimed talking into it. She pointed at him again, then herself, looking left and right, raised two fingers, trying to type, paused, and then slowly shook her head. "Yeah, the other two don't have the technical aptitude to man this one. Or... woman it." Her face broke out in a smile, a silent laugh escaping from her. Aberdeen chuckled as well. It was the first time he'd seen her do this. The first time she'd laughed in a long, long time. 

The interior would prove to be a much bigger challenge than either of them would expect to be. Christine's eyes darted around the walls and ceiling. She glanced at the exit, then took a slow breath. Sweat appeared on her brow. 

"We got this. Don't worry. Just go slow."

They began to move past the shelving along the walls. Broken light fixtures hung from the ceiling. To the left was a fuse box on the wall, and a row of broken terminals atop a counter. To the right, a door. The pair moved towards the door when Aberdeen's Pip-Boy started to crackle. He looked to Christine, who looked anxious. It's a radio - he could hear it over the static. He kept moving forward, Christine glued to her spot on the floor out of fear. The door was jammed, and the radio was right beyond it. He stepped back.

"We need to get power running to the door. Then I can take care of that radio. Your blocking abilities... We should be able to get through here without hearing a single beep, huh?" She physically relaxed a little bit, then pointed to the fuse box. "Yeah, let's try that." 

It had been jury-rigged at some point long in the past, and was certainly in need of repairs. A few parts could fix it, but Abby was smart enough to stick a few of the wires back together and rearrange the fuses to get it running. The sound of the door opening was a sign that it worked, and behind them, a few of the terminals came on. The words "listen before you lose ahead" hadn't escaped his mindful eye. The past survivors of this place left messages everywhere. Listening wouldn't be hard. Past the door was more writing on the wall. 

TICK TICK TICK. An arrow pointing into the corner. A swift pistol shot to it silenced the static on the radio, and the courier waved Christine forward. Just around the corner was another one, and an electrical box. Lots of those in here, it seemed. Lots of speakers, too. It would be slow-going. The next speaker was well hidden, above the line of sight, but Christine pointed it out and it was dealt with. 

The next real room was expansive. Below lay a sea of cloud, waves sweeping over the bottom level. Ahead was the door they needed to get through... if the walkway hadn't conveniently collapsed at some point in the past. The only way there was to go down and around. They started to descend, peering around for the best possible ways around the cloud, when Aberdeen noticed a wide pipe resting just above the cloud line that ran basically right to the other set of stairs.

"Christine... how good are you at jumping?" She gave him a weird look, waving her hand and then giving a thumbs up. "So. On the better side, then. Alright... you want to take a stupid risk with me?" She blinked, slowly, then nodded, but didn't look too happy with it. "Don't worry, I have pretty decent luck." He backed up and took a running leap, hopping off the railing for an extra boost, landing with a roll on the pipe below. Not too bad. He'd have some bruises, but not too bad at all! "C'mon, the water's fine!" He encouraged. He backed up to leave room for his companion, who followed shortly after. "She sticks the landing!" He gave a small round of applause to a silent audience. She gave a short bow before urging him forward. After a short half-second dip in the cloud, they ascended the stairs to the room that was across the way. 

Nice, safe looking room. 

"Christine, we should try to get some rest in here if at all possible. I know sleep is hard for you, but... maybe I can find something to help." He looked around, in the next room, in this room, only finding a few chairs, but it was all safe enough. No sort of bed rolls. "Can you sleep on the floor?" She nodded. Her exhaustion was clear to him. He cleared out a spot for her in the next room, finding thankfully at least an old jacket hanging in a locker for her to rest her head on. There was a first-aid kit, as well, in the terminal room, that he managed to cobble together a Med-X and some scotch from to help Christine fall asleep... and stay asleep. He watched over her, feeling his own drowsiness set in, but there was work to be done. He ensured the door to the terminal room was locked, just in case anyone were to wander in, and went to the next door. Already he could hear a radio, his Pip-Boy buzzing. Christine stirred a bit, but didn't awaken. 

So off he went. Immediate left turn first, hopping across a pipe, to deactivate the turrets. One damn thing after another. An elevator here. Good, so they were close. Terminal here was inaccessible... left that be for the time being. Round the corner to come to another terminal... nothing interesting... speaker here, too, around to the right along the pathway. Both of them in here were shielded. 

Wasn't hard to loop around and run to the next alcove with a terminal that was easy to hack through and turn the speakers off. No more annoying buzzing, but his neck still itched. He went back, sat on a chair at the table, feeling his eyelids grow heavy. The structure of the metal palace around him groaned and settled. He shouldn't sleep. He shouldn't sleep. He kept combating it away. Vision hazy, head spinning.

He wasn't really sure when it was that he fell asleep. He dropped immediately into a memory nightmare. The red of the cloud-dyed Villa opened out into a swarm of Marked Men... coming up out of the Divide, following him in through the Villa. He ran and ran, ghost people throwing themselves at him and the sound of gunshots from the Marked Men following behind. The twisting paths led him to a dead end. The cloud shifted, a stiff wind blowing it through the corridors of the villa. Aberdeen backed towards the wall - the only way he could go without fully suffocating. The collar beeped as he reached it, and he knew that somewhere, up high, a radio, out of sight, out of reach, was sealing his fate. He took a look through the cloud, staring at the menacing figures of the ghost people staggering within. He took a deep breath, pushed off the wall, diving into the cloud and sprinting towards freedom, or certain death.

When he burst from the cloud, it was into a black void. He could feel himself plummeting. Below him, an overlook of the Divide, and the hoards of faces. Above him, the night sky. Staring into its gullet and a maw full of stars. He crashed into the crowd. They absorbed him, and he could feel each of his limbs being torn, his entrails pulled out, his screams going unnoticed. His neck, his neck. A beeping resonating with his heart,  _beep, beep, beep, beep._  He tugged at the collar, he struggled, he cried out -

_"O, Lord, what are human beings that you  care for them, mere mortals that you think of them?! They are like your breath; their days are like fleeting shadow! Part your heavens, Lord, and come down; touch the mountains so that they smoke! Send forth lightning and scatter the enemy; shoot your arrows and rout them! Reach down your hand from on high; deliver me and rescue me from the mighty waters, from the hands o-"_

Drowned were his words, his thoughts, in a cough of his own blood, in the hands of the monsters that monsters like him had created. The cycle continues.

And Christine shook him awake. He took a big gasp in, head darting back and forth. 

"Wh... Chris..." His voice was hoarse, throat sore. She had a very concerned look on her face. She opened her mouth wide, eyes scrunched closed, like she was screaming, then relaxed her face and pointed to him. "I... was screaming in my sleep." She nodded. "I'm sorry, I... I didn't mean to fall asleep." She shook her head and sat on the chair next to him. Aberdeen straightened himself out. stretching his stiff and sore body. All of his limbs were still there, but he had a... vaguely out-of-body sense. Phantom limb syndrome, but.. not quite. His breathing evened out, finally, and he still felt exhausted. 

"I'm sorry for putting you through that. What time is it..?" He checked the Pip-Boy. It had been long enough. "Ah. Did you sleep... at all?" She nodded, giving a gentle smile. "So, pretty okay, then. That's good." He chuckled. "Looks like I'm sort of a dreamcatcher, huh?" She gave him a quizzical look. "Oh, dreamcatchers... are this Pre-War thing, the idea of them was that you'd hang them near your bed at night and they'd protect you from bad dreams. A travelling storyteller told me about them." Her face turned to understanding, then shame, eyes staring hard down at the table. "Hey! Don't feel bad about it. We all have our demons. You slept. That's what matters. Need you in tip-top shape for whatever comes next, eh?"

Courier Six, the man of a thousand tales. His mind swirled and it took him some time to recover and lead his companion over to the elevator. She motioned to Aberdeen, pointing at the door uneasily. She seemed hesitant to go near it. 

"You need to go down to the manual bypass room to regulate the power." She glanced at the elevator, expression worried, then looked back at him and reluctantly shook her head. "All right. Let me see if I can find another way to do this without sending you down there." She smiled slightly in relief, and nodded. She opened her mouth slightly, then closed it, frustrated. She pointed to him, making her hand into a fist against her chest and nodded. "You want to punch me in the chest or... you appreciate what I'm doing." She made a pout with angry eyes and punched him in the chest playfully. "Or both!" He laughed. "This computer here, I looked at while you were sleeping, actually. I can't access it, so I'll go looking for the pass code for it, alright?" 

She merely nodded again, then took a seat in the chair by the computer and spun around in it a few times while he went searching. A locker key he found on another desk had given him access to a paper with the pass code on it, so he passed it onto Christine. 

_In case of emergencies, power regulation procedures can be carried out from this station. However, this practice is not recommended for regular use. Please see your supervisor concerning whether use of this station is warranted._

She looked up to him, eyebrow raised.

"Do I look like your supervisor?" She smirked and hit enter, transferring control to the station. "Are you going to be okay here?" She nodded... then gestured at his hand, offering hers. He took it, and she held it, meeting his eyes intently for a few moments. She gave his hand a gentle squeeze, then released it and smiled gently. "Good luck, Christine. We'll get through this."

With that, he took the piece of chalk he'd been carrying around, muttered a small blessing, and drew a cross on the wall above the terminal before exiting without another word. Christine would gaze up at it and wonder how a man as good as him, who had seen the worst in humanity, could believe in a higher power in the timeline that God had abandoned.

 

* * *

 

 

"Veronica Santangelo."

"Yes, sir."

"Didn't think you'd ever return here... and you bring company with you. Tell me, Scribe, is this person a member of the Brotherhood?"

"N... No, sir." She hung her head low. Arcade wanted to say something, talk about his connections to the Enclave, but he knew better. The Enclave was shunned by most of the Brotherhood nowadays anyway. 

"And you led them here knowing full well you would be exposing us to the outside world?"

"But sir-"

"Do not interrupt me, Scribe. The Elder will have words with you, and you'll be lucky if you aren't removed from the Brotherhood for this, or worse. And you!" The Paladin barked at Arcade, who stood at attention. "Remove your mask, put down your weapons. State your name, affiliations, and intentions. Now! My patience wears thin."

He did as he was told, taking a deep breath. "My name is Arcade Israel Gannon. I am a doctor with the Followers of the Apocalypse. My intentions here are not of any threat or harm to the Brotherhood. I seek information on a location known as the Sierra Madre."

The Paladin narrowed his eyes. "And you asked Veronica to take you here?"

"She led me here on her own volition, sir. She thought with her position that it would be of help to my mission."

"Santangelo!"

"Sir."

"Why are you following this man?"

"I am not, sir. I am accompanying him."

"Why the hell do you want information on the Sierra Madre?"

"We're looking for someone who was taken there. Courier Six." The Paladin's eyes widened, his expression softening.

"You... know him?"

"Yes, sir. We were travelling with him. We have reason to believe that Elijah has taken him against his will."

The Paladin's weapon lowered, his eyes looking to the ground and head shaking. He sighed. "Here's what I'm going to do for you, Santangelo, Gannon. Courier Six helped us out, so this... Is my way of repaying him. I will take you to the archive room, and you can speak to Taggart. He should know something." The Paladin looked directly at Veronica. "This is also going to be revenge on Elijah, that cowardly son of a bitch. Don't say I never did anything for you. Stay silent. Speak to no one until we find Taggart. Leave your weapons here. They will remain untouched. Come."

The two obeyed, and followed the Paladin deep into the bunker.

 

* * *

 

 

The path outwards was clear after dropping from the second floor of the area the elevator took him up to. A stop at the vending machine on the way out, and picking up Dog who whined about how long he was gone for, and they were headed to drop him off. Salida del Sol was the destination.

"Dog not want go..."

"Gotta."

"Cage there!"

"I'll make sure that you don't get locked in the cage, Dog. Don't worry."

"Master promise?"

"Promise."

How a nightkin knew what a promise meant was beyond him, but it satisfied Dog. Dog was obedient, to a fault. The path to Salida del Sol was unnervingly quiet and empty, with only one ghost person that came waddling at them from down a path past the entryway.

Salida del Sol, like Puesta, was crimson with cloud-dyed buildings. 

"Cage over there with things to pull, hard to pull. Dog can do it. Done it before? Not remember."

"Shh, Dog, be quiet. Do you hear that?" Not far away, in the central plaza, were several ghost people. Their breathing was loud enough to hear from their location. Grenades, grenades... "Dog, I am begging you, do not run in front of me until I am done shooting."

Wait. Just, wait. Aberdeen watched until they started to gather into a trio. Pull the pin.. and a nice lobbed toss will dismember any group of the undead. Dog rushed forward as soon as Aberdeen gave the signal that it was okay to have his meals. A full dog is a happy dog. And, for the most part, a quiet dog. Traversing through hallways, homes, stairwells, rooftops, clearing out paths, a simple lather, rinse, repeat method. Even one of Dean's stashes was discovered with a good load of purified water and - thank God - microfusion cells! Aberdeen had been running low on those after the last few mobs. He drank down two bottles and while he was at it, had himself a Salisbury Steak. His stomach felt better, something he hadn't even noticed was that it was, in fact, in pain from hunger and anxiety. 

Down below where he found the stash was a long corridor of concentrated cloud. He had Dog stay put and tried to weave his way through it, like Dean had shown him, but had to retreat when his collar started beeping. His heart wrenched at the sound, plummeting into his stomach in memory of the nightmare from just a few hours ago. He turned about-face and exited.

"Not going that way if we can avoid it!"

"Master, Dog stomach hurt."

"Mine too, buddy. Don't worry. this nightmare will be over soon." 

On the trail again, up into another household, a glowing terminal lighting the way. Upon examination, most of Aberdeen's fears had been quelled: he could turn off the speakers from this one. He hoped that it was for all of them in Salida. Knowing this hell town, it probably wasn't, but it was a start. There was company outside, he could hear. He went sneaking along the rooftop, Dog following with his back pressed up against the building so he wouldn't fall off. Around the corner to the left that beeping returned. You can turn off the speakers, but you couldn't turn off individual radios. He urged Dog to double back, but Dog was interrupted when a knife spear came flying past and hitting right next to where his head was going next.

Down below, two... no, three ghost people came wandering out. One of them held a gas bomb in their hands.

"Dog?"

"Yes, master?"

"I hate this fucking place."

What did he have at the ready? Pistol, with enough ammo, and a knife. Everything else was packed away or strapped to his back. A good enough shot to the gas bomb could potentially kill all three of the ghost people. Dog slid off the roof and went charging in.

"No, Dog! Bad! Stop!" His shouts fell on deaf ears. Aberdeen jumped down, feeling the impact good from the height in his knees, scrambled his holorifle up and over his shoulder and went running in. Time now for another good idea, bad idea!

Good idea: Dog grabbing Gas Bomb and throwing it against the wall, incapacitating their explosive friend.

Bad idea: Aberdeen charging right into battle while scrambling his shit together.

How does a spear to the shoulder sound? Pretty painful, right? Yeah, that's all up in Aberdeen's business right now. This would most certainly effect his aiming ability. He got all up in Spear's business in return, shoving his holorifle right into its face and giving him the new nickname of the post-apocalyptic Jackson Pollock. Not really, he doesn't know who that is, but the imagery is good. While Dog crunched down on Gas Bomb, adrenaline pulsed through Aberdeen as he very heroically pulled the spear from his shoulder and threw it at Bear Fist McGee, who was seriously reconsidering their life choices at this moment. The spear went through ITS shoulder, effectively pinning the ghost person to the ground while it uselessly flailed about until one of the two came around to dismember its sorry ass.

And then Aberdeen stabbed a stimpak into his arm, bandaged himself up, and pointed to where they needed to go breathlessly. He had enough of this shit. 

"Place with hard pull things is over there..." True enough, switches on the wall to the left, two iron gate doors opening into the area. "'W' on your wrist thing? Weh-st. West." He nodded firmly. 

"...Yes, Dog, this is where you will be... uh, helping master." There was blood everywhere.

"Why are we here? Dog not want to be here. Place too much like a cage for Dog. If Dog was fed like last time, Dog would listen, if the feeding was quiet."

"Dog you.. literally  _just_ ate. Can it wait? I need you to stay here and trigger the switches."

"Always need more..." The nightkin's fists clenched, voice growing violent. "Dog not understand. Too hungry... hard to hear words... Master, when can Dog feed." It wasn't so much a question as it was a statement. "Maybe voice could make Dog stay. Dog not want to be in cage. Dog want to be free, find Master."

"Are you telling me I need to release..." He turned back to the switches.

_WHERE IS YOUR GOD NOW?_

"...God."

To call upon the power of the divine sounds like a thing from a fantasy novel. When the bombs first fell, some saw it as the wrath of whatever Gods they believed in, touching down on the lands of those who had sinned, cleansing the world. Humans create their own Gods. And when Aberdeen read the word, read the chest of the nightkin, he had a name to give the alternate personality of it. He didn't want to have to do this.

A few clicks on the Pip-Boy, and the voice came: "Dog! Back in your cage!"

"So here we are... A row of switches, all lined up. How familiar."

And Aberdeen looked into the face of God.

"These switches won't move themselves, after all... there must be some trick to it. Now that I'm here... what do you expect  _me_ to do?" He was cold, evil, teasing. He knows what to do, and that Aberdeen needs help.

"Do you know how to operate these switches?" He pointed to them, voice wary.

"Of course I do! But after you threw me into the cage at the police station, I have  _no_ intention of telling you."

"...Alright, that's.. fair. But I  _need_ you to trust me to get through this. Dog... Dog isn't listening to me."

"Not even Dog will listen to you!" The nightkin chortled. "Isn't that a fun twist of events. You can get your floozy ghoul to listen to you, the scarred girl... but when it comes to me, something that isn't human, you've not even got a foot in the door. So tell me, human, how will you resolve this? I'm not staying here and doing what you 'order' me to do. Not again."

"I presume a promise to let you stay in control would be of no use to you. Even if I were to drag food out here, satiate Dog, keep him quiet so you could be in full control... You'd shrug it off, because I've wronged you."

"Smarter than most."

"..." He idly wandered over to the diagram, studying it, eyeing God. Then he wandered back, looking at the gates. Maybe intimidation was the way to go. "I've given you a name."

"Oh, is the name Dog gave himself not enough?"

"No, not Dog.  _You_. The one who resides within Dog. You flip the name around, the personality... You are God."

"I don't enjoy being named after one of your fictitious religious beings."

"Mm, that's a shame. Some people have... idled with the thought, before, of killing God." Aberdeen turned, revealing the holorifle to be pointed at God's head. His legs had brought him to the center of the entrance. "You, uh, you might want to just stay right there, bud."

"You-!" The rage-fueled nightkin stepped forward, arms raised, but Six shot just to the left, singeing his ear. He cried out, pressing a palm to his head. He stepped further back, keeping his gun aimed to the nightkin. "Do you  _really_ think that threatening me will work for your little scheme?!"

"Maybe. Maybe not." He reached over to the terminal, tapping into it. "All I know is," he hit the button to close the gate, "I can play one voice clip of Elijah after throwing some bodies up over the top of the arch," the gates completed their close, "and Dog will think that master has left him food so he doesn't get hungry."

"You  _impudent_ little- when I see you next I'll-"

"Yeah, yeah, you'll crush me and squeeze me and turn me into a pulp, whatever, I'm gonna go get my pet some food, buh-bye!"

He ignored the screams that followed. Did you know that it's, like,  _really_ hard to drag a couple of dead bodies around? Especially when they're squishy and smell bad? Oh, but the  _look_ on God's face - what a treasure. Carve that into the side of a mountain and you got yourself a monument to one man's hubris. Well, it worked. He chopped the bodies up into easily-hockable pieces and tossed them up over the roof. A few stuck up top, but hey. Most of their bodies fell with a pretty nasty sound on the other side, and smaller bits could squeeze through the gate. 

And he played Elijah's voice.

"Master? Why is Dog in cage? Why did master bring voice out? Why Dog head hurt?" He ran to the gate, shaking it. It wouldn't budge, even to his strength. 

"Hey! Heyyyy, Dog, come on, don't worry! Master brought you  _lots_ of food, see? And you'll be fine. Master talked to the voice to make sure the voice wouldn't come out and try to hurt you." Dog nodded at this. The courier splayed his hands out to show the body parts laying about. "You'll be safe, and fed. Do you think you can figure out that paper on the wall over there?"

Dog turned and wandered to the paper. He stared at it for a few, excruciatingly long, minutes.

"Dog?"

"Yes, master. Dog know how."

"Good  _boy_ , Dog! Master has to go now. Be good!"

He only heard the sound of the nightkin slowly, almost thoughtfully, chewing on the limbs as he got the fuck out of there. 

 

* * *

 

 

"...the foggiest idea of what you're talking about."

Veronica stared at Taggart blankly.

"I'm just messin' with you," he grinned, patting playfully on her shoulder. 

"This isn't a joking matter, Taggart."

"Sheesh, no comedic relief allowed, huh?" He shook his head. "Anyway, Courier Six, Elijah, Sierra Madre... that's a lot for you guys to be dealing with right now. I don't have the authority to look through certain archives, and before you stop me, yes, I know, I'm the head scribe, I have access to all the archives, but there are some things..." He shook his head. "Some things just were never meant to be seen again by anyone."

"I take it that information on the Madre is part of that."

"Yes. Well, I think so. I know I've seen something about it before. Give me a couple of hours. I'll do the thorough searching and get back to you. In the meantime, go get some rest. You two look exhausted."

"I won't sleep until we find him," muttered Arcade.

"Arc, come on. At least go sit down."

"Fine, fine."

 

* * *

 

 

"The bell tower. That's where you'll trigger the Gala Event. It's a ways up. I'm sure you'll find a way to climb up there."

"Elijah, what the hell is so special about the Sierra Madre, hm? What's in there that you need  _so badly?_ "

"The Madre... rumored to be El Dorado, the city of gold... No mere rumors, my boy. Beneath it's towering complex lays a hidden treasure beyond the wildest imaginations of any common thief. Stacks of gold. Weapons. Caps. You name it, and it's in the vault."

"That.. that's it?! You're getting us all murdered over  _gold?!_ "

"Do you have any idea how much gold is still worth?! What it can be used for in a practical sense? I'll be rich, and after the Madre has fallen into my clutches, soon will follow the people of the Mojave... and more."

"You have the motivations of a comic book super villain."

"Don't insult me, or I'll set that collar of yours off. Get to the tower." There was an audible noise of the coms being shut off between them, like slamming the phone down after a heated call. Is that a reference people still get? Aberdeen looked on his map. The bell tower was nearby, actually. He scanned the area, looking for a towering building... But he couldn't, other than the casino, which would tower over everything. It was in the northern section of Salida del Sol, so he would have to make his way around to that entrance. The long way, sadly, running into a few ghost people and risking his head being blown off. Easy enough to disable those with a pistol pop. Up some stairs at a dead end... with something ominous written next to the door.

"Where are we?"

If only he knew.

The house the door lead him into descended into what looked like a storage area. More writing on the walls, everywhere. 

_RUN, RUN, RUN_

_NOWHERE TO RUN_

_DEAD END_

And high above, the distant chiming of a bell. This place was riddled with ghost people. He'd have to get smart. Instead of wasting bullets, Aberdeen waited silently until one was close enough to drag in and quickly stab in the head a few times or chop their foot off with a clean hit. He would never really be able to get their stench out of his nose or off of his skin. The first four he encountered were the toughest to deal with in their group. Once again, dealing with low ammo. He dug through everything he could see to find spare ammo. Vending machines didn't have any, but the healing items were nice. Dean stashes - there had to be one around here, surely. It might have been right next to a radio, but it was there! With ammo! And thank his prepping ass, another pistol. Repair time!

Bear traps were a real issue in this part of town. Every direction he went, in fact, there was a bear trap in the way. He had terrible weapons, horrible armor, and worst of all, he was sober.

This was the worst vacation ever.

A covered passageway that turned Aberdeen into a sonar led out into a square. He turned once he was safely out of the beep-range and found the speaker, then headed back in and.. there was another. Just up the stairs, on the inside wall above his head. He wondered if this was some sort of.. hilarious thing to the designers of this place, to hide the speakers-

Oh, wait. It's so people couldn't fuck with them. Hide them, let them enjoy the music, and no one will pull stupid pranks with them. 

Radroaches weren't totally uncommon, either.

There was a makeshift ramp leading upwards, but he was smart enough to look up and check what was up there. Ghost people. Lots of them. He lobbed a grenade up there, which in turn, set off another two explosions, and sent corpses out the hole in the building. It was  _supposed_ to be an ambush, but, way to go and ruin it, Aberdeen. 

_These fucks have enough brains to put together gas bombs, build spears and use bear traps for fists... and they're only attracted to living beings, no material goods can satisfy them._

He kept making crosses along the walls as he went. There was no telling when he might need to get back, and this place was HUGE! He ended up finding where to really... go. Campanas del Sol, said his map as he climbed the stairs. Giant, empty plaza, towering steeple, ripe, probably, with ghost people. He didn't see any immediately. Stairs leading downwards were coated in cloud, and he was not about to have any of that. So up it was, to his destination.

Oh, but did their breathing give them away. He stayed low, stayed hidden, stayed quiet. He had to find a way up that involved not being harmed, killed, or worse, dragged off by those abominations. Through a brightly it hole in the wall. An old morgue, by the looks of the skeletons and embalming fluid. Down the stairs, into a wine cellar. Empty. Up the stairs where... a very creepy sacrificial scene was displayed. Okay, then. This place is weird. A ghost person had appeared in the plaza below. No, two. They threw up spears with nearly devastating accuracy, landing right at his feet.

"Where did you fucking  _come from?!_ "

He took a great deal of care to not be seen by them. The less ammo he had to use. One hole in the wall to his left, one up ahead. To the left... oh, yes, God, yes, microfusion cells. He might get out of this alive after all. Ahead he continued, having to run through a stairwell to avoid being killed by a radio and finding it upstairs. Just... turn that one off. Ammunition box outside, for the pistol. He liked that. And... an inactive speaker. He  _didn't_ like that. Between hidden speakers, ghost people popping from nowhere, and the cloud, there would be nowhere to go.

He finally came up to the top of the bell tower. There was something oddly beautiful at staring out into a sea of clouds, especially being able to at a height that could see the sun. The sky here was not blue, but the sun lit up the area like a field of roses. Out one side, he could see the casino, rising even higher on the cliffside. 

"Can you hear me?" Elijah. "Damn transceivers. Let me link the collars to the speaker in the tower... then... there."

He heard a series of sharp taps, then two, slow taps. Huh? "Uh, hello?" Tapping again. "Christine..?" Single tap. "Oh, cool, okay. Guess we should have learned morse code or something in our time together." She tapped a few times, paused, tapped a few more, paused, then once more. "Okay, smartass. We'll be starting soon." 

Then, "Dog is ready to be good, pull switches, see the _lights._ "

And after, "What are you waiting for?" Dean's voice was  _everywhere_. "Rubbing it in? Strike up the band already. Careful when you do.. you think the Villa's bad now, you haven't seen anything yet."

"Show's about to begin. People, take your places!" 

Dean cackled over the speakers.

"Finally," came Elijah. "Now, the gates will open. And so will the skies." Spotlights on the Madre, fireworks surrounding everything. He watched... but heard commotion below. He glanced down... the ghost people. They really were coming out the woodwork. Gathering below, crowding around the tower. Dozens of them. Shambling, mobbing.

He had seven grenades left. He had... four throwing spears? Two knives... a few guns, but... there was no way he could get them all from up here. He would get what he could. And that music,  _God_ , that music. It was annoying as shit. 

He took a deep breath, crossed his chest. He will deliver them to their final resting place, act reaper to the lost souls of the damned. The bell chimed, again, and again, out of sync with the music. 

"Who does the bell toll for?" He mounted his holorifle on the ledge of the tower. "Not me, aye, but for thee, and all those who annoy me." 

 

* * *

 

 

"I have something."

Veronica had gone to sleep. Arcade's nerves kept him awake, however, so he was able to receive the good word. 

"It's... only a small thing, but it is probably going to be the most useful for you."

"What do you have?"

"A map."

Arcade jolted upright in his seat. "A map?"

"It's all I could find. It's a map for the greater area outside the Mojave. Here, in this southwest corner..." Taggart laid the map out flat on the table in front of Arcade. "This, right here," he pointed to a dot on the map. "The initials, S.M. Three day's travel from here."

"...Good lord," Arcade wiped sweat from his forehead. "That's far..."

"How long's it been since he disappeared?"

"I... a good number of days."

"How do you know if he's even still alive?"

Arcade explained the radio. 

"Mm. Let's hope it's not something that was pre-recorded in the days during his disappearance."

"They're ongoing. We hear bits and snippets. New things, all the time. Nothing repeats."

"That's good news, then. I'll let you keep this. Just... don't tell anyone about this."

"You have my word."

Arcade wasted no time in waking his companion up and getting a move on. The sandstorm outside had settled. It was mid-afternoon. Three days. Even if he escaped from the Madre's grasp, they would... hopefully... run into him. Tirelessly, they would walk, disappearing into the haze.

 


	15. Ad Portas Infiris

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This seems familiar. Too familiar.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> is anyone even still reading this?  
> ..  
> there's like...  
> a lot

**_BONG!_ **

Shuffling. Bodies, heads, eyes, hands stirred awake.

_**BONG!** _

Crackling like lightning, static speaking through a veil.

**_BONG!_ **

"Qui me tangit, vocem meam audit," sings the bell, high in its steeple. 

**_BONG!_ **

"My God," speaks the courier, imprisoned in his high cage, "what have I done?"

**_BONG!_ **

Below, the square filled. Streams of the inhabitants of the Villa. Rivers of ghost people. An ocean of death. 

Aberdeen had, once, seen before a similar sight. Warheads scattered about in front of him, many more harbored beneath the ground. On a pale horse rode in death, Courier Six, Aberdeen, all one and the same. The crowd, then, too, was angry, and they hungered for something far worse than blood. Deeper than revenge. They wanted retribution. They wanted life to once again grace their fingertips. The Marked Men, scarred by the irradiated winds of the Divide and the cold heart of the Mojave. The ghost people, living memories of those that hid from the war, that survived the bombs.

Aberdeen sank to his knees, rolling back to curl into a fetal position. Music played from all over. He felt the vice around his throat grip tighter, and in his anxiety, his fingers grabbed desperately at it. He pleaded with the good Lord above to let him free from his yoke of flesh. To end his own life, he would see as cowardice. Let it go by the cause of another, the doings of free will of minds lost to the poison of the Earth. 

* * *

 

"Is that an...  _alarm bell?_ " Veronica leaned in closer to the radio. Only half a day's walk in and already, the signal was growing clearer. "No, that's... more like a church bell, wouldn't you say, Arc?"

"God, what is that? It's drowning everything else out..." He shook the radio, as if that were any help. The two had passed it between each other, adjusting it as they went. "Do you hear something like scratching? Or..." He turned the volume all the way up, pressing his ear to the speaker. In the background, it wasn't scratching. It was speaking. The conversation from right before the event went off. "There's... others there, with Aberdeen, but I can't tell if they're with him, or..." He trailed off, hearing popping noises. "Hm. Wonder what that is."

"Fireworks?" Veronica shrugged. "That'd be a bit silly, though, probably just the radio doing it's weird thing."

"Yeah, probably."

The bell song would follow them for another hour, at least, at which point, they turned it off to rest their feet, promising silently that they'd turn it back on when they got back on the road. Get supplies. Eat... lunch, for fuck's sake, go to the bathroom in a covered shelter for what would probably be the last time before they hit the most southern farms of the Mojave.

* * *

 

Five.

Count five things you can see.

The bell... which was purely ornamental; the ringing was coming from, get this, a speaker inside the bell. Hoaky bullshit. Stones building the windows that peered out over the Villa. The Sierra Madre itself. The switch. His quivering hands, failing to light a cigarette.

Four.

Count four things you can touch.

The cold stone beneath him. The cigarette. His weapons. The damned switch.

Three.

Count three things you can hear.

The bell. The fireworks. The music.

Two.

Count two things you can smell.

Sulfur... and copper.

One.

Count one thing you can taste.

The bittersweet burn of salvation, the cigarette smoke he gulped down a bit too eagerly. He coughed before resuming. He was still shaking. No way, no  _fucking_ way could he get through that. Christine, Dog, hell, even Dean would be able to help him. But he desperately kept holding onto some strange, false hope that he would reunite with Arcade... and Veronica. As he imagined that embrace of reuniting, he unconsciously reached his hand out to grasp at nothing but empty air. The vision of his dear Arcade dissipated into the smoke he billowed out. Courier Six wiped the fear from his face, chewing on the end of his cigarette, and peered up over the edge of the sill into the square below him.

How long had it been since he sunk down? He could only tell by the watch on his Pip-Boy, it had been at the very least two hours since he arrived at the steeple. The tearless sobs had wracked through him for most of that until he was able to come down and see reason, see what was held in the depths:

He took a deep breath, almost of ease: his shell-shock had made him imagine there to be far more than there were. Hallucinations were not... for him, at least, an effect of post traumatic stress, though he would not think on this. An effect of prolonged exposure to the cloud. There were maybe ten of them in the square that he could see, and he didn't have to kill all of them, he just had to get past them. He was much, much quicker than them, and knew the way back.

Cross marks the spot, Christ leads the way. He flicked his butt out and watched it descend until it was no longer visible. 

He lifted the hatch, got down the ladder, and began to run like hell.

Risking life and limb, he jumped down entire flights of stairs, over banisters, shoving the mobbing hands of the ghost people back against walls, away, away. A grenade toss to the crowds, following the signs:  _RUN, RUN, RUN_. They knew. How would they know? In what cruel universe did the previous victims to the Sierra Madre know to run from this place, that such an event would happen? Ah, maybe not that they knew about the event, but of the lurking evils.  _GET OUT OF HERE_. Follow the marks, pointing away from the sound of the bell. 

The air stung inside of him, and the sting of spears being flung at him knocked him into reality. He could hear the broken speakers but it was only so long until one caught his head... or a bear trap caught his leg.

Abby doubled over instantly, rolling to the ground to catch his leg in astonishment and terror. How could he have missed it on his way in? Did a ghost person manage to lay the trap afterwards? Not entirely impossible. Panting, he tore through his pant leg to observe the damage. The adrenaline rushing through him dulled the realization of pain, and he tasted blood from how hard he was biting his lip to suppress a scream of agony. He pounded his fist against the concrete, scooting his body into a corner behind the counter; here, at least, he could defend himself with no blind spots. Here, at least, he could hide until the crowd dispersed. The shop around him glowed with a dull crimson. The vending machine - of course, a doctors bag, of course, it would have all he would need. 

"Arcade," he whimpered uselessly, "I need you more than ever..."

He could, of course, treat himself. He pried the bear trap off, watching blood sink into his boots. It wasn't the same when there wasn't a doctor to treat him. He bit into his arm and went about setting the break, hearing the staggered moans of ghost people above him. It wasn't the same when he was sitting in the care of a friend. They were not alerted to his presence, thankfully. It wasn't the same without Arcade. 

This world is hollow without love. 

A makeshift cast, some Med-X, and a few swigs of scotch. He couldn't afford to break down again, not here, not now. He, stupidly, focused on the pain that shot through him to keep him grounded. He would deal with the consequences another time. Now, he would not run. Now, he would sneak. Take it slow. Baby steps. Knife in hand and vengeance in his heart. Revenge against the sinful undead. Revenge against Elijah, revenge against this place, revenge against the accursed hunger for gold that ran in its veins. 

They leapt from the rooftops. They crawled in from sewer grates. Every one of their moves was analyzed and unmissed by Courier Six, and each of their attacks ended at the end point of his knife. No longer would he run; his panic set aside to cold, steely resolve and he mercilessly, with nary a word or bullet shot, butchered the ghost people that stood in his path. When his collar beeped he wiped the blood from his face and shot the speakers where he could.

_Follow the signs of God, and destroy those who stand in my path._

How did anxiety turn into pure, unbridled rage? Was it the adrenaline? 

Regardless the cause, Aberdeen stood, with a sudden realization, in front of the gates of Sierra Madre. Hell, by any other name, smelled just as rank.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sometimes i wonder if anyone looks at my notes and thinks, there's no fuckin way this guy wrote all this, look at his notes, he's a pleb, a doofus, a complete buffoon  
> i wanna let you know... i did write this... and ur right i'm a ding dong B)  
> ALSO updates will be a lot more infrequent now because A) i have depression, B) I play DnD on the regular and C) I work many jobs but IT WILL HAPPEN


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